'Bodies' scare has innocent end

Police called to reports of bodies strewn across one of Norfolk's major roads found scarecrows instead. Horrified motorists rang police after seeing what appeared to be dead people lying next to the A47 between Dereham and Honingham.

But arriving on the scene officers discovered the sightings were scarecrows stolen from Yaxham village festival.

One had been hung off a bridge to make it look like someone had committed suicide, with several others laid across country lanes and along the A47.



The gruesome practical joke started off as a community project designed to involve the whole village in Yaxham primary school's harvest-themed Autumn Fair. More than 40 straw creations were put up around the village on Sunday but that evening vandals stole and decapitated around 20 of the new residents.

The scarecrows were taken to Dereham police station, and all of them have now been collected by their owners. Other scarecrows have been found around the village decapitated or with limbs removed.

Police are treating the incident as nuisance behaviour and anyone who finds a scarecrow is being urged to take it to Dereham police station.