Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Gary Grif­fith yes­ter­day said an in­ves­ti­ga­tion has been launched in­to the dump­ing of 2020 Gen­er­al Elec­tion polling cards in Ari­ma.

The dis­cov­ery was first made by a mem­ber of the pub­lic, who said he was told of it anony­mous­ly by a res­i­dent of the area on Wednes­day night. The man said he went to the Pin­to Road area him­self to in­ves­ti­gate the mat­ter and af­ter he found the dumped stash record­ed it and post­ed the video on so­cial me­dia.

In a re­lease yes­ter­day, Grif­fith said around 6.25 pm on Wednes­day, a min­is­ter of re­li­gion and a for­mer Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment, re­ceived in­for­ma­tion from an anony­mous caller and pro­ceed­ed to a bushy area at Mot­t­ley Trace, Pin­to Road, Ari­ma, ac­com­pa­nied by a friend. While there, Grif­fith said the min­is­ter ob­served a quan­ti­ty of elec­toral polling cards in a bushy area and re­port­ed the dis­cov­ery to the po­lice.

WPC Smith and PC D’Abreau of the Pin­to Po­lice Post re­spond­ed to the re­port and cor­doned off the area. The scene was processed by WPC Edghill-Mar­cano and a team from the North­ern Di­vi­sion Crime Scene In­ves­ti­ga­tors. The polling cards were pack­aged in­to four small brown pa­per ev­i­dence bags and hand­ed over to ag In­sp Ward, who is con­tin­u­ing en­quiries, the CoP said.

The op­er­a­tion was co­or­di­nat­ed by Supt Ed­wards and was su­per­vised by In­sp. Birch, Ag In­sp Ward and W/SgtRobin­son-Mot­t­ley.