Police appeal
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by Amanda Bradbury • Hauliers are at the centre of police attempts to net the IRA killers who planted a tipper full of explosives in the City of London last Saturday.
City of London police described the haulage industry's input as "particularly vital in this case" because the vehicle is their strongest lead.
Staffs-based general haulier Les Glover owns the Iveco Ford eight-legger which contained the bomb.
Police are anxious to trace the tipper's movements since 20 March, when it was stolen at around 03:00hrs from a locked yard at Talke, near Newcastle under Lyme, Staffs. The white cabbed. aluminium-bodied 300.25 was resprayed dark blue before the bombing.
Commander David Tucker, head of Scotland Yard's anti-terrorist branch, has appealed to everyone in the road transport industry to try and remember if they saw the tipper: The probability is that it has been in a yard or somewhere similar, possibly a spray shop," he says. The question is, have you seen it on the move; have you seen it in the process of being painted: or have you sold a large quantity of blue paint to somebody who might have repainted it?"
The tipper was registered 1)883 XFP, but the plates were swapped before the bombing on 24 April.
The new plates, number G430 DVT, were stolen from a dark blue Iveco Ford tipper owned by a Manchester-based haulier. A spokesman for dealer Chatfields of Hanley, Staffs, which sold the G-reg tipper, says it was found burned out on 21 April.
At the time of the theft of the Newcastle tipper used in the bombing, no one could understand why a newer tipper with a larger engine owned by Glover and standing next to the stolen vehicle had been passed over for a D-reg model.
The 0,000 tipper was supplied to Glover by Harper Martin of Hanley; co-owner Garry Harper says: "It seemed strange at the time that they would pinch a cheaper vehicle –of course it all