Stolen Newcastle United jumper returned to Morpeth charity shop

A Newcastle United top which was stolen from a charity shop has been returned anonymously.

The knitted jumper was donated to Age UK in Morpeth, Northumberland, but within hours of it being put on display it had vanished.

But following an appeal on social media, the item reappeared the next day.

Shop manager Tina Scott said: “I was over the moon, we folded it up, we put it straight in the glass cabinet and we had about 10 people come in wanting to buy it.”

The Newcastle United jumper featured a Brown Ale logo which was used on the club’s strip in the 1990s.

“We’d never seen anything like it before,” Miss Scott said. “It was definitely from the Newcastle shop, because it had the tags inside.”

The top was put on display on Friday for “a reasonable sum”, but within two hours it had been stolen.

“We hunted the shop high and low and we were quite gutted, to be fair. I was furious, to be honest, I was absolutely furious,” Miss Scott said.

“People don’t understand, if we don’t get donations and we don’t make money, it won’t be us struggling, it’ll be older people struggling.”

But the following day the item reappeared, and was found hanging on a coat hanger in the menswear section in a “soaking wet plastic bag”.

“I’d put a post on social media and there were a lot of comments,” Miss Scott said. “A lot of people were angry.

“It was just a very weird situation but I’m just happy it got returned because the money we raise goes towards elderly people.

“We’re doing a lot of work around loneliness and it’s just so important that work continues.”