The big question, of course, is WHY? Why would anyone want to steal 200,000 Cadbury Crème Eggs? Two maybe, but 200,000!
I came across this story buried in this morning’s Guardian, of how Yorkshireman Joby Pool stole more than £31,000 worth of these chocolate eggs when he broke into an industrial unit in Telford in February and made off with the haul in a stolen lorry cab.
Strangely, as far as I can see, the story has not been picked up by any of the tabloids.
Now we all love Cadbury’s Crème Eggs, usually to our cost. Most of us find them irresistible. As Canadian actress Caroline Rhea once confessed: “I lied on my Weight Watchers list. I put down that I had three eggs... but they were Cadbury Crème Eggs.”
It seems that Pool planned his crime for some time, using a metal grinder, no less, to break into an industrial unit in Telford, Shropshire. And more, some months earlier he stole the tractor unit needed to transport his high calorific haul.
It seems that Pool was stopped by police within the hour as he was travelling northbound on the M42. He walked towards the police “with his hands up” near junction 11.
Shortly after his arrest, West Mercia police described the incident in a series of tweets as an “eggs-travagant theft” of a “chocolate collection box”.
But why? What do you do with 200,000 Cadbury Crème Eggs? My guess is that no fence would touch them – apart from eating a couple. It’s not that you can flush them down the toilet during a police raid or cover them with a beach towel. You would need a big lock-up.
Moreover, you can’t simply lie low for several Easters and then carefully offload your haul. I’m not sure how long the expiry date is for this Easter treat but it can’t be that long.
And a Cadbury Crème Egg isn’t exactly a high value item, valued in the court documents at just 15.5p each. Very simply the economics don’t stand up, especially if you flood the market and force down the price to a few pence.
Furthermore, you can’t just sell them off in some pub. I would be surprised if even Ms Rhea, mentioned above, would buy more than five in one go– unless she wanted to share some with her Weight Watchers class.
Neither is there a national shortage, at least not until Mr Pool drove some 200,000 up the M42 – although I have just checked and Tesco online is out of stock! (Mild panic)
Yesterday, as reported in the Shropshire Star with which I have registered just for this story, Judge Anthony Lowe jailed Pool for 18 months at Shrewsbury crown court. For the record, he had form.
Defending Pool, Debra White said he had shown genuine remorse for what he had done, and was sorry for the effect it had had on his family and the business involved. In his defence, she argued that Pool had suffered a number of recent "losses".
So was this high-calorie heist simply a plea for help? Even a deep need, as much spiritual as psychological.
Only last week we witnessed the tragic collapse of Huw Edwards, whose alleged actions were every bit as irrational as that of Joby Pool. Who would have thought what lies beneath?
This kind of irrational and self-harming behaviour would come as no surprise to the apostle Paul. We are all prey, each of us, to irrational and injurious behaviour to meet some inner need, even a deep anguish. It can so easily become compulsive.
So the apostle Paul, in a high level of emotional turmoil, shares himself in his letter to the Romans: “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good.” (Romans 7:15f)
Commentators disagree in the context of his remarks, whether Paul was writing as a disciple of Jesus or reflecting on his life before Christ as an apparently law-abiding Pharisee. Either way he is being completely honest and naming the problem: “As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me.” (v17).
And here he voices the prayer for us all, caught in the maelstrom of sin, the prayer of every human heart: “HELP, can anyone help me?”
Here his conclusion stands for us. “The answer, thank God, is that Jesus Christ can and does. He acted to set things right in this life of contradictions where I want to serve God with all my heart and mind, but am pulled by the influence of sin to do something totally different.” (Romans 7:25, the Message translation).
Which means, of course, we dare not bend down to take up the first stone. We may come across as a loser, like the unfortunate Mr Pool or someone totally in control of ourselves, like Huw Edwards. Either way, the reality is that we are sinners, each of us, in need of a Saviour.