THE headteacher of a special school has blasted thieves who forced their way into the computer room on Sunday afternoon and stole £5,000 worth of equipment.

Frank Steel, head at Rose Hill School, in Windermere Drive, Warndon, branded the raid as "despicable" and said the theft of two laptop computers and a multimedia projector had been a real blow for the school which caters for children with learning difficulties.

"They forced their way in through the skylight of the IT room, which was locked," said Mr Steel.

"What makes it particularly frustrating is that the laptops are password protected so they will be unusable anyway.

"A lot of time and effort had gone in to getting staff up to speed using the multimedia projector which is often used for assemblies.

"It's very frustrating because we've all worked hard developing ITC - information technology communication - and this has been a huge setback."

After snatching the computers, the raiders piled furniture into the middle of the room and used it as a makeshift ladder to escape through the skylight.

School caretaker Alan Smith discovered the theft yesterday morning.

A police spokesman said the burglary occurred at around 4.15pm on Sunday and appealed to anyone who was in the area at the time who saw anyone acting suspiciously to contact Worcester police on 08457 444888 quoting reference number 63S/080903.