IPSWICH: Furious mum Louise Youngs today hit out at thieves who she believes have put the safety of her small sons at risk.

Her family has had garden equipment stolen three times over the last three months – on one occasion the thieves took two fence panels which were needed to allow sons Kyle, three, and Samuel, two, to play safely in the garden of their Shakespeare Road home.

Mrs Youngs believes her home has been targeted since they built a conservatory earlier this year.

She said: “It is quite a large conservatory and I think some people must think there are more valuable things here than there actually are.

“It is worrying that we have been hit three times now. They’ve taken a very large garden chair and hanging baskets.

“But it was the fence panels that were taken that really worry us. We had put them up after the first incident because they’d cut the chain fence into Whitton Park.

“Kyle is autistic so we need to have a secure space in the back garden so he cannot just go wandering off. The chain was cut so we bought some fencing panels – and then they were taken.”

Police officers had told Mrs Youngs the garden could have been specifically targeted.

She said: “I’ve spoken to the neighbours and they don’t seem to have had the same problems although one of them did see some youngsters hanging around.

“But I don’t think this is just the work of mindless youths – they would probably just dump what they take. These things have been taken away completely and that cannot have been easy.

“The chair they took was very large. It could not have just been carried off for any distance.”

The fence between the garden of their house and the park has now been repaired by Ipswich council – but Mrs Youngs said the incidents had made the family very nervous.

She said: “We would like to have gone on holiday but we dare not leave the house for fear of what we will find when we get back.

“All these things are making life very difficult for us. We now feel we are being victimised by all this.”

n Have you been a theft victim? Write to Your Letters, Evening Star, 30 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich, IP4 1AN or e-mail eveningstarletters@eveningstar.co.uk