Get your property marked - and stand a chance of getting it back.

That was today's stark warning from police who revealed more than 25 uncoded bikes have been stolen in the town since the new year.

For the sake of just £5 you could make sure police don't have to hand your property back to the thief who stole it because it has not been claimed.

Officers have been overwhelmed by a flood of suspected stolen and lost property which now needs to be reunited with its owners.

PC Dave Smith, of Basildon crime desk, said: "For the sake of £5 for a little UV marker pen from a good stationery shop, or taking a list of serial numbers, you are protected if anything goes wrong."

There are currently 80 unclaimed and untraced pedal cycles in storage after being handed to Basildon police or seized.

Every piece of property seized or handed in to Basildon Police Station is scanned for the invisible marks, usually the owner's post code and house number. If marked, the owner can be traced and the property handed back.

But, if no owner can be traced, seized property must be handed back to the person it was taken from.

PC Smith said: "We seize TVs, Playstations, computer games and cameras, but we end up having to give it back to the villain if we can't prove it's stolen. We do not like doing that.

"Serial numbers can be removed, but the UV mark is invisible, so the thief doesn't know it's there."

Unclaimed - Sgt Andy Willmott with some of the recovered cycles

Picture: STEPHEN LLOYD

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.