A TATTOO artist has spoken of his disgust after a charity box was stolen from his studio.

Donald MacPhee and Clare Newton, who own the Harwich Tattoo Studio in West Street, Harwich, have been left furious at the theft.

The RNLI lifeboat charity box, in the shape of a lifeboat, was on the windowsill of their studio when it was taken on May 28.

But it was not discovered missing for days until someone was going to make a donation.

Donald said: “For years we have supported the lifeboat.

“People who want to give tips we say put a donation to the lifeboat.

“And we had a lot of body piercing jewellery we didn’t see so we just ask for a donation for the lifeboat for those pieces of body jewellery.

“We had a woman come in who took a couple of pieces of the jewellery and wanted to put a donation in the box, but it wasn’t there.

“The shutter had been down for a while for repairs and the charity box is on the windowsill with leaflets for the waiting room.

“We had moved all that off for the repairs to be done, so I thought I would be able to find it later.”

But when Donald went to look for the charity box, he could not find it.

It was only when they reviewed the CCTV footage for the studio they saw it was stolen.

He added: “I’m absolutely disgusted - it’s the lifeboat, it’s a charity box.

“They save lives and are all volunteers.

“This is the first time it’s happened in about 20 or 25 years - it’s sad. We’ve always been able to trust people, but we are now having to wait for a new charity box with a chain.

“I think there could have been about £35 in there.”

A spokesman for Essex Police said they were called to reports of a theft of a charity collection box at an address in West Street, Harwich.

Anyone with information is asked to contact PC Robert Mcafee at Harwich police station on 101 or call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555111.