Officers were called to Pelham Rise at 8.40pm on October 11 after a man was seen bleeding. When officers arrived, they were unsure of the exact route taken by the suspect, but a flicker of light had been seen in a field earlier. So PD Hox, a two-year-old German Shepherd, handled by PC Gareth Evers, was deployed to help track down the suspect. PC Evers said: “I was well briefed by the officers on scene, and although the exact route taken by the suspects was unknown, a flicker of light was seen about 200 metres into the field where it was believed the suspect had lit a cigarette among bushes. “I kept PD Hox deployed on a lead because the search area was far too great and progress through a ploughed field was slow. “Hox began to track naturally and took me through to a small clearing in the bushes, over a barbed wire fence and into a neighbouring field. “He then indicated to me where the suspect was. It was pitch black but we found a suspect sitting in high grass.” Police charged 26-year-old James Graves, of Central Avenue, Telscombe Cliffs, with two counts of causing criminal damage, theft in a dwelling, and assault by beating. He appeared before Brighton Magistrates’ Court on October 13 and was has been remanded on conditional bail to appear before the court again on December 7.
