Defibrillator stolen from Bookham village

A potentially life-saving defibrillator installed in a Surrey village on a spot where a person died has been stolen.

The equipment was taken from its cabinet outside the butchers in Bookham High Street.

South East Coast Ambulance Service said it was a "mindless" theft and the equipment would be of no benefit to those who had taken it.

The trust has appealed for information and the incident is being investigated by Surrey Police.

Darren Reynolds, head of voluntary services at the trust, said: "Defibrillators are such vital pieces of life-saving equipment, and the installation of this one was particularly poignant.

"Its location was above the exact spot where there was sadly an unsuccessful resuscitation attempt last year."

The ambulance trust said the incident in 2012 led to people spending a lot of time and effort raising funds for the public access defibrillator and had also led to the device being placed in that part of the High Street.

The Cardiac Science G3 machine was worth about £1,200 and funded by the Rotary Club of Bookham and Horsley.

The ambulance trust currently has about 1,400 public access defibrillators across Kent, Sussex and Surrey and has installed about 50 in the past 12 months.

Defibrillators are used to deliver a shock to restart a patient's heart when they are in cardiac arrest, and the public access machines talk the user through how they must be used with support from the ambulance control centre.