Three men arrested on suspicion of handling stolen goods as nearly £500,000 of misappropriated 'valuable' farming machinery

Search warrants were executed at two rural locations in East Dorset on June 14.

Hampshire Constabulary and Dorset Police formed a partnership as part of Operation Hardware, in a bid to tackle organised crime.

The investigation was formed following a suspicious incident where a vehicle, on the A338, mounted a grass area and disappeared when it was being tailed by police.

It later transpired that it was stolen from London.

The number plates were cloned from a vehicle out of the county, so the insured driver was not the legal owner.

This allowed officers to search their home address.