War memorials desecrated by vandals just days before remembrance services are set to take place have been repaired.

Sutton Council has acted quickly to bring in stone masons and repair damage to plaques at Carshalton Memorial by Carshalton Ponds.

The damage was first reported last week.

Officers from Sutton police are treating the attack at Carshalton War Memorial as a criminal matter.

In addition to the desecration of the memories of Corporal Derek Wood, who was brutally murdered on March 19, 1988, and Acting Sergeant George Mepstead, killed on July 31, 1966, in a terrorist attack in the Saudi Arabian peninsula city of Aden, now Yemen, the vandals also scratched the slate plaques of the old First World War memorial and the new World War II memorial.

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After the vandals struck

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The repaired plaque

Councillor Jill Whitehead, chairman of the environment and neighbourhood committee, said: “This abhorrent act was discovered by our parks team last Thursday and we notified the police straight away in the hope that the culprit can be found.

“As well as the scratches on the slate plaque on the World War I Memorial, a scratch was also found across three plaques on the new World War II memorial.

“We immediately brought in specialist stonemasons to assess the damage.”

The work was completed yesterday.

The borough’s official Service of Remembrance will take place on Sunday, November 9, at Carshalton War Memorial from 10.15am. Council leader Ruth Dombey, Sutton’s mayor Councillor Arthur Hookway and other dignitaries will attend and lay wreaths.

This will be followed on Tuesday, November 11, with a ceremony outside the Civic Offices in Trinity Square just before 11am, which will include a minute’s silence.

Police are investigating this crime and looking at forensic opportunities and CCTV of the area.

Officers are urging anyone with information about the culprits, who may have been bragging about what they have done, to call Sutton police on 101 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.