A nine-foot high ceramic model of Batman has been stolen from a family's garden just a week after it was put in place.
The figure, on a pedestal, belonged to 12-year-old Aron Buxton who won it in a TV competition. It was stolen from the family's back garden in Luddington Road, Stratford-upon-Avon at the weekend while they were away on holiday.
Aron's mother Sandra, 47, said: "I was hanging my washing up and I looked around the garden and thought 'what's different?'
"It took a few moments to register that Batman had gone - I was just so shocked. "I called my husband to see if he could have moved it - though I didn't think that was likely and it was only when he said he hadn't that I realised what had happened.
"It is quite heavy so it would have needed a few people to lift it away."
Sandra, a librarian, said: "Aron just loved the statue. He won it on BBC2's The Mighty Truck of Stuff and he'd gone to London for the day for it.
"He thought he was just going to be in the audience but then he appeared in the show to win the statue against five other people.
"All his friends at school saw it and he was really excited. He wanted to show it off during the holidays.
"The statue was such a unique thing - a real talking point, we just moved it a week ago to the bottom of the garden."
The family think it was stolen by opportunistic thieves. Police in Stratford want to hear from anyone who saw the statue being removed from its location or has any knowledge of its whereabouts.
