Charity buckets stolen at peaceful protest in town centre

Yesterday afternoon, Bolton Ukrainian Cultural Centre, and residents from across the borough gathered to raise funds to help their loved ones back home whilst singing songs and staging a protest against Putin.

What was an emotional and heart-warming show of support quickly turned into anger and great sadness for the group after their charity buckets which were placed at the front of the protest were stolen when the event finished.

Yaroslaw Tymchyshyn, Bolton Branch Chair of the Association of Ukrainians in Great Britain said the group are saddened that someone could do something so cruel.

Group gathers to show their solidarity with Ukraine (Image: Yaroslaw Tymchyshyn)

He said: “We were wrapping up our weekly demo on the steps of Bolton Town Hall when a man picked up the collection buckets and speed of.

“A number of us gave chase but were unable to catch him.

“This is now a police incident.

“In over 30 times we have gathered, nothing like this has happened.

“So sad.

“As normal when we finish these events we have two buckets, one a bit smaller than the other, so the smaller one I normally insert inside the larger one and then I went to put away all our other stuff including the pop-up banner and the flag.

“So, I was engaged in that, we left the buckets in case anyone wanted to donate anymore cash whilst we were still there.

“So, I had finished clearing up and was speaking to two people who were leaving when someone else comes up to me and tells me someone has stolen the money.

READ MORE: Group gathers for peaceful protest in solidarity with Ukraine

“They said this guy has taken the money and taken the buckets, so a group of us went to see if we could catch him.

“I ran as fast as I could towards the library, and I presumed he had gone towards Morrisons when he hadn’t.

“He had gone towards Ashburner Street, he went past Bolton News Offices and turned right, and we had gone left.

“We didn’t catch him, but one of our older gentlemen from Ukraine actually went the right way and that’s when he managed to get the buckets off him but because he was a large guy, he was struggling to get anything off him.

“He managed to get the buckets, but the man got off.

“Our Ukrainian friend said the man was actually counting the money, he had stopped to count the money.

Peaceful protest turns to sadness as money stolen (Image: Newsquest)

“Unfortunately, the man has still got the money, all the notes that were kindly donated from the public and a bag of donations which we had collected earlier.

“We are looking at £150 to £200 worth of money that has been stolen as well as a megaphone.

“Every one of us is angry, I feel guilty because I am the one in charge and the book stops with me so I’m really not happy and because people have given their money in good faith.

“Everybody was on a high but then this it just hit us.

“I feel totally heartbroken.

“One or two of the guests have actually phoned me to ask me what is going on, and I just think how does it look to our Ukrainian guests that some man has done this stealing money that was destined to help their countryman in Ukraine, they think this type of thing shouldn’t happen here.”

A spokesman for Greater Manchester Police said: “At around 1pm on Saturday 15 October 2022, Greater Manchester Police received a report of a theft in Victoria Square, Bolton.

“An investigation is still ongoing at this time to locate the suspect.

“Anyone who can help officers with their enquiries or saw the incident happen are asked to call 101 quoting 1616 of 15/10/22.”