Coronavirus: Lockdown fundamentalists may be behind ‘horrific nail traps’ planted at beauty spots, council leader says

‘It is shocking. It is stupid. What they’re doing, it could cause unimaginable injury to someone’

Nail trap left at Margrove Woods in East Cleveland (Janclare Miller)

So-called lockdown fundamentalists may be behind nail traps planted at a range of Northeast beauty spots, a local council leader has said.

The horrific makeshift devices have been left hidden in the undergrowth of a number of wooded areas around East Cleveland.

On Thursday, police took the unusual step of warning runners, cyclists and dog-walkers to be especially cautious while using beauty spots over the coming weeks.

And speaking to The Independent, Mary Lanigan, who leads Redcar and Cleveland District Council, said she thought the vicious campaign could be the work of someone taking umbrage at others exercising in such rural retreats during ongoing coronavirus restrictions.

“This isn’t the work of kids,” she said. “They started appearing not long after the lockdown so I’m not sure it’s a coincidence but … whoever it is, it is shocking. It is stupid. What they’re doing, it could cause unimaginable injury to someone. It has to stop.”

She added: “People have a right to exercise here. If the people putting these horrific traps think they may be helping in some way, all they will do is add to the pressures on our hospitals.”

The first traps — essentially nails hammered through wood — appeared in the area’s Margrove Woods at the beginning of May. More have since been laid there with others also being reported at a range of other spots including Guisborough Forest.

Janclare Miller, whose husband Paul had to call for a lift home after his bike tyre was punctured by one, said: “They had been buried under the soil and leaves so he didn’t see them the first time.

“I couldn’t believe it; all I kept thinking was what could have happened if he had fallen on them?”

Speaking to the local Gazette newspaper, she added: “He’s lucky he only rode over it. I dread to think what could have happened if he had fallen, or if a child had.”

The revelation comes on the same day North Yorkshire Police said they had spoken to a former parish councillor and retired teacher who had admitted building a blockade of rocks and branches across a cyclist trail in woodland near Leyburn.

In a statement about the nail traps, a spokesperson for Cleveland Police said it had made the Forestry Commission aware of the traps and that officers would now patrol the areas affected.

They said: “Police would also like to make it clear that anyone who is caught planting the traps will be arrested and will be potentially left with a criminal record.”