THE trustee of a West Devon village charity has been left heartbroken after a laptop was stolen from its office.

Bergen, which aims to help regenerate Bere Alston, had an Acer Aspire 4752 laptop stolen from its office in the Bere Alston Parish Hall.

The theft came at the end of a productive placement funded by Vodaphone World Difference project.

In four months Sara Pike, a trustee of Bergen, had raised £7,452 in grants and had started a highly successful Chef's Bight Off event, where families come to eat together on one Friday night a month at minimal cost, as well as working towards the strategic development of the charity.

The theft appeared to have occurred on the afternoon of Saturday, July 13, when the hall was open for a sale.

The person involved accessed the foyer area and somehow entered the office and walked away with the laptop, leaving its charging leads behind.

As all other doors were locked, the thief is assumed to have walked through the sale area with the laptop hidden about their person.

Although the laptop is password-protected and the majority of the data is backed up, it still contained a lot of information, research, email addresses and web links that were useful to the charity and will take a considerable time to restore.

Sara said: 'It's heart-breaking. The funding of my post has expired and I am doing the work voluntarily now.

'Losing the laptop has meant that I am having to spend precious time repeating my previous activities and therefore not increasing the income of the charity.

'We have come so far in just four months and I needed everything in place to keep what little time I do have used as productively as possible.

'The Memory Café and Luncheon Club are due to start in september and I have lost three weeks of preparation.'

Sara said the charity's income is on a knife-edge at the moment and cannot afford to replace the laptop.

Anyone with any information relating to the theft is asked to contact police on 101 or contact Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555111.