Police arrested four suspects after using stingers to bring a lorry on false plates to a halt.
Roads Policing Unit officers travelled to the A1 at Newark after hearing that a vehicle had been sighted on cloned plates.
The truck in question was spotted by the team around midnight earlier today (15 January) – at which point attempts were made to stop it.
After trailing it for a short while, a plan was set up to deploy stingers to puncture the vehicle’s tyres as it made its way along the A1 towards Elkesley.
The sting was successfully carried out by the waiting officers, with the rest of the team then moving in using their cars to safely box the lorry in.
A large pair of bolt cutters were, at that point, seen being thrown from the vehicle – causing officers to believe its occupants could be involved in criminal activity.
All four people on board were detained, while the driver was made to take a roadside breathalyser test and drugs wipe.
The latter subsequently returned positive results for traces of cannabis, while the former indicated that the driver was over the legal alcohol limit.
Two men – aged 19 and 41 – and two boys – aged 16 and 17 – were arrested on suspicion of going equipped to steal.
The 41-year-old man, meanwhile, was additionally arrested on suspicion of drink-driving, drug-driving, driving without a licence, and driving without valid insurance.
Sergeant James Carrington, of Nottinghamshire Police, said:
“The officers involved in this job did a great job working together to bring this lorry to a safe stop.
“After receiving information from a neighbouring force that a vehicle on cloned plates was making its way into our county, the team utilised all the available resources to quickly track it down.
“They then showcased great skill to set up a successful sting deployment to slow the truck down before boxing the vehicle in at the side of the road.
“As a result of the efforts of the officers involved this morning, we were able to arrest four people suspected of being involved in criminal activity and seize a vehicle on cloned plates.”