A second-year St Anne’s student became the victim of theft last week, after a set of DJ’s decks worth £1,000 were stolen from a Halloween house party.
The student, Simon Maxwell-Stewart, was hosting the party at his house just off Iffley Road last Friday night. Around a hundred people turned up, including a number of strangers whom Maxwell-Stewart and his housemates believe may be responsible for the theft.
The missing equipment included two Pioneer CDJ-200 CD decks, worth £300 each, a Pioneer DJM400 mixer worth £400 and a £20 UV light. New College Student TJ Hertz, a DJ at the Oxford electronic night Eclectric, and one of Maxwell-Stewart’s house-mates, said: “We think we know who did it”, TJ said, “One of the guys was wandering around the party suspiciously for a lot of the evening.
“The guy was black, 18-25, maybe 5’5″ with a big thick coat that he pulled up over his face for a lot of the time.”
TJ described how the stranger’s behaviour became more conspicuous during the party:
“At about 6.30pm he stumbled into the bedroom next to the living room, where my friend and his girlfriend were inside. The guy said something along the lines of ‘Sorry, thought the garden was through this way’ before leaving. The decks disappeared in the next 15 minutes.”
The theft was not discovered until the following morning.
“At about 6.45 in the morning a friend of mine came upstairs and mentioned casually ‘I see you’ve put the decks away,'” TJ said, “at which point I went downstairs and realised the decks and mixer were nowhere to be seen.
“We found a chair propped up against the back wall of the garden, next to some ivy that looked like it had been pulled down.” Simon and his housemates found the mobile number of the party-goer acting suspiciously and called him last Sunday, when he was told to call the next day to “get his decks back.”
“We’re still trying to find out his name and where he lives, but it’s looking unlikely,” TJ said. “We’ve been to the police, who said they could set up a meeting, but obviously that hasn’t happened.
“We’ll see if they can find his address through his phone number but I’m sceptical. There’s almost certainly not enough evidence for the police to charge him.”
