Officers from Staffordshire Police are looking for a man who broke into a charity shop at a Longton shopping centre.

The man smashed a window on the door to gain entry to the Animal Lifeline charity shop at the Longton Exchange shopping centre in the early hours of Friday morning (28 March).

He left with "a bag of items" from the shop's Easter display just before 2am.

Animal Lifeline cares for and re-homes abandoned dogs and puppies in the city and relies on volunteers, donations and its charity shops to fund its work.

A Trustee of the charity, Emma Caskie, told Stoke Nub News: "Sadly it's not just us. We have spoken to other small business owners in the area who have seen a rise in break-ins in recent months.

"The value of the items is so small and if someone was struggling and came into the shop who didn't have a lot of money and wanted an Easter egg out of the window then we would have given it to them."

Each year the charity rescues and re-homes around 300 dogs and puppies and has saved more than 11,000 over the years.

Animal Lifeline said in a statement: "On Friday we were alerted to our shop door being smashed and all of the front easter display at the shop gone- sadly this meant we had to shut while doing emergency repairs which is a loss of vital income for us and will now have to replace the door glass at a cost

"We realise times are hard for a lot of people but breaking into a charity shop and taking items is beyond comprehension.

"Thank you to everyone who visits our shop regularly as it is a vital lifeline for us to be able to continue to help dogs as we can"

A spokesperson for Staffordshire Police said: "We were called at 7.20am on Friday (28 March) to Longton Exchange Shopping Centre after a man smashed a shop window.

"It happened just before 2am. He then enters the shop and leaves with a bag of items.

"The suspect was wearing a white jacket, black bottoms, black trainers and carrying a blue backpack."

Anyone with any CCTV, doorbell or dashcam footage of the area of the time is asked to contact Staffordshire Police. Call 101, quoting incident 96 of 28 March, or use LiveChat on the website.

To report anonymously, call Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.

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