Public help needed to find local identity’s distinctive trike

Nelson artist, athlete and former politician Mike Ward is appealing for the return of his distinctive yellow tricycle after it was stolen on Valentine’s Day.

The yellow-coloured trike was taken between 9:30pm and 11pm from outside Morri Cafe on Hardy St while Ward was working late in his upstairs workshop.

‘‘I just sort of took a break in my armchair, normally if I’m working late I stick it out the back and inside, but I got up around 11pm and thought, damn, my trike’s still outside, so I went down and it was no longer there.’’

Ward reported the theft to police and in his search for clues to its whereabouts had already received some valuable assistance from street protestor Lewis Stanton who had seen the trike being ridden by a possible suspect that evening.

‘‘He didn’t know it was mine but he gave me a description of the guy who took it and told him which cameras he’d been on.’’

Ward has owned the yellow trike for nearly three years but previously owned another trike back in 2003.

This was the second time that one of his trikes had been taken and he was hopeful of a similar resolution to the first theft.

‘‘It was on a Saturday morning, so I rang the [paper], and by 1:30pm that afternoon a guy was knocking on my door to tell me he’d found my trike ... it was in the back of his ute,’’ he said.

Ward said the trike had practical as well as personal value.

‘‘I love to take my stuff to the market on a Saturday morning, to drag my trailer behind and it’s a bugger not having it – there are all sorts of reasons why I need it.’’