Apple Airtags lead police to Perth Hills election sign thief

A cunning plan to attach Apple Airtags to the Liberal candidate for Kalamunda Adam Hort’s election signage in the Perth Hills has helped police net an election signage thief.

The Liberals, which have had thousands of dollars worth of signage in the Perth Hills stolen over the past two months, believe the plan’s success led to the dumping of hundreds of stolen signs from conservative parties in bushland off the Great Eastern Highway.

Hundreds of election signs from conservative leaning parties were found dumped off Great Eastern Highway in Greenmount this week.Credit: Rebecca Peppiatt

The Liberals campaign team in the Perth hills decided to purchase eight of the Apple tracking devices after losing up to 10 signs a night – worth about $100 – which one campaign insider said was the worst he’d ever seen.

Those included signs for Hort, federal Liberal candidate for Bullwinkel Matt Moran and state Liberal candidate for Midland candidate Mike Matich.

The Airtags were stuck to the signs earlier this month and on February 19 two were stolen and tracked back to a home in Darlington.

Police were alerted and attended the home and retrieved the signs from the shocked resident.

The Liberals declined to provide details of the thief – noting that they had decided not to press charges and the thief had apologised to police when caught out.

Police dropped the signs off shortly after and confirmed the incident was closed with no offence.

“The signs were tracked back to the residence, they were returned to the owner with nil damage to the signs,” a spokesman said.

A few days later an enormous pile of signs from conservative-leaning candidates including Hort, Moran, Nationals Bullwinkel candidate Mia Davies as well as Australian Christians and One Nation candidates was found in bushland off Great Eastern Highway in Greenmount.

Hundreds of election signs from conservative leaning parties were found dumped off Great Eastern Highway in Greenmount this week.Credit: Rebecca Peppiatt

On X earlier this week Mundaring Police issued a plea for information for election sign thefts over the past fortnight in Mt Helena.

The Liberals’ theory is that the incident with the Airtags was relayed to other sign thieves who dumped their stolen signs.

“It’s incredibly disappointing that our opponents would resort to such desperate measures,” a Liberal spokesman said.

“We will not be distracted or discouraged by their poor behaviour, and our campaign remains focused on the right priorities.”

Davies said if it was a Labor-aligned person who stole the signs they should focus on actually addressing crime in their community rather than perpetrating it.

“This type of behaviour is simply not on – whoever is responsible – it shows a lack respect, pettiness and disregard,” she said.

“Focus on policy and the community and less on petty political tactics.”

WA Labor rejected the suggestion it was involved in the sign thefts.

“The allegations from the WA Liberals just show they have the wrong priorities,” a spokeswoman said.

“Political signage is an important part of a local campaign and WA Labor volunteers put a lot of time and effort in putting them across the community.

“Our WA Labor candidates and members are getting on with the job and focused on delivering in the interests in their communities.

“It’s a shame there are some bad eggs in the community engaging in bad behaviour and anyone who sees a person damaging or deliberately removing erected signs should report it to authorities.”

Theft and vandalism of election signage has been rampant this state election.

Liberal candidate Bronwyn Waugh in South Perth has had several signs defaced with crude drawings of penises, while Churchlands candidate Basil Zempilas has taken to social media to highlight his sign theft plight.

This is the first election with a spending cap of $130,000 on individual campaigns, so signage theft eats into their campaign war chests.

The Shire of Mundaring declined to comment.

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