Travelling people who smashed their way into the private grounds of a derelict factory site in Glenrothes before setting up an illegal encampment have left the site.
Travelling people who smashed their way into the private grounds of a derelict factory site in Glenrothes before setting up an illegal encampment have left the site.
The Travellers who broke through a security fence and parked their caravans at the former Pico factory just minutes after being evicted from land at another location in the town departed overnight Saturday into Sunday.
All that remained to show they had been there were some bags of rubbish at the site and a giant mound of earth piled up at the gates by the landowner to prevent Travellers from returning.
A Police Scotland spokesperson told The Courier he did not know when the Travellers had left or where they had gone.
The Courier told last week that the landowner, businessman Andrew Davie, faced a massive bill in costs as legal moves to evict the Travellers went ahead.
He had plans to demolish the derelict factory last Wednesday but this had to be abandoned when the Travelling people arrived on Tuesday night after being evicted from a site at Southfield earlier that day.
Businesses on the industrial estate were so concerned about security that it emerged they had hired their own private security firm to patrol the area at night following concerns about a spike in local crime.
It came as police investigated a break-in at nearby Bongos soft play centre on Wednesday night which resulted in the theft of a safe containing thousands of pounds.
There have been previous problems in the area with breaking and entering, lead being stripped from roofs and copper thefts.
Swedish-owned Glenrothes company Spectrogon UK Ltd, which evicted the Travellers from their land a short distance away at Southfield last Tuesday, also beefed up security by having trenches dug around their site to make sure the Travellers could not return.
Glenrothes and Central Fife MP Lindsay Roy has hit outat the “sheer impotency” of the law when it comes to dealing with Travelling people.
The Scottish Government has said the rights of the Gypsy/Traveller population to follow their traditions must be exercised responsibly.