Thief takes adze but leaves plenty of evidence behind

An ancient Maori adze has been stolen from a glass case at Aratoi, Wairarapa's museum of art and history in Masterton, but the thief has been caught on camera.

In what appears to be an opportunist and poorly thought-out robbery, a man was clearly seen on Aratoi's video surveillance camera taking the piece after he wrenched up a perspex case and reached for the stone tool.

As well as clear video footage, the police have lifted fingerprints from the display case.

The director of the gallery, Marcus Boroughs, is confident the artefact will be recovered given the amount of evidence available to trace the thief.

"With the high quality camera security system and the fingerprints we've pretty much got all the evidence we need, apart from him actually wearing a huge name tag on his T-shirt," Mr Boroughs said.

The theft happened just after 3pm on Monday.

- NZPA