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Daily Record
Daily Record
National
David Meikle

£3000 reward offered for info on terrifying firebomb attacks at Scots councillor's home

A £3,000 reward has been offered for information about terrifying attacks at the home of a Conservative councillor.

Graeme Campbell, who has previously spoken out about gangsters and organised crime, had his property in Strathaven, Lanarkshire, targeted by thugs.

Two BMW motors were burnt out and part of his home was left ruined.

An incident in June was the third time he had been attacked and Campbell, 52, has told how he considered taking his own life over the vendetta.

Crimestoppers has now offered a reward for anonymous information in connection with the cowardly attacks.

Crimestoppers Scotland manager Angela Parker said: "Our charity believes in safe communities and these attacks on a family home have caused great distress to those involved and also to people living in the wider area.

"We need to have whoever is involved held to account.

"If you know who was involved, you can tell us completely anonymously by calling our charity's Contact Centre which is open 24/7 on freephone 0800 555 111 or you can use our easy and secure anonymous online form at crimestoppers-uk.org.

Councillor Graeme Campbell after his cars were vandalised (Victoria Stewart Reach Scotland)

"Please do the right thing. You'll be following hundreds of thousands of Scots who have trusted our charity with their anonymous information since we began in the late 1980s.

"Whilst being independent of the police, we support the public to speak up by passing on anonymous information we receive that helps keep people and communities safe from harm."

Detectives probing the June attack revealed an accelerant had been poured over cars belonging to Campbell and his wife and a male seen on CCTV is believed to have set himself alight during the incident leaving him with burns to his arms, body and face.

He is described as being of slim build and was wearing a dark beanie hat, jogging top with two stripes down both shoulders with the hood up, jogging bottoms with two stripes down each leg, a high-vis reflective jacket and a rucksack.

Detectives believe the male approached Campbell's home on foot, started the blaze and then fled towards Strathaven town centre.

Other attacks against Campbell in May 2019 and August last year were condemned as an attack on democracy and the matter has also been raised twice in Holyrood at First Minister's Questions.

The councillor, who was first elected in 2007, claimed he had been targeted over a case he had been working on as part of his role with the council.

He quit politics and has moved away from the Strathaven area.

Speaking out after Tory MP Sir David Amess was killed at a constituency surgery, Campbell said: "After the first attack, my wife came up to me in tears because somebody on social media said 'maybe they will come back and kill that Tory councillor, because there will be one less Tory family in Scotland'.

"That's how bad it got."

"There's no way back for us. We may walk away from Scotland completely and go somewhere else.

"I'm not ashamed to see that at one point this year I've literally wanted to go and buy enough Nurofen to kill the pain for good. It's been that horrendous.

"A home is not just bricks and mortar, it's a living, breathing space where you bring up your family.

"We've had our house stripped away from us, nearly all of our possessions destroyed. Our world has just been ripped apart."

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