‘MINDLESS’ vandals, who caused around £5,000 worth of damage at a leisure centre, were caught out on social media after they took to Twitter to boast about their crimes.

Staff arriving at Cricklade Leisure Centre on Saturday morning found the swimming pool and surrounding areas severely damaged.

A window was cracked, wood from the children’s play park was ripped up and the pool cover was ruined.

Centre director Gary Walker said the total bill from the vandals’ antics was expected to be up to £5,000.

He said: “They put themselves in danger, let alone the risk they caused to the building.

“It was a high risk, mindless act of vandalism.

“All of the swimming equipment was strewn everywhere. There was an awful lot of log fencing removed from the play park which they used to get in through the window.”

A member of staff decided to carry out their own detective work after they witnessed the destruction caused at their centre. Using Twitter, they were able to locate the people they believe committed the crime after uncovering tweets by the suspected vandals bragging about their actions.

“It shows how idiotic they are, if they’ve got themselves known from Twitter,” said Mr Walker. “We have passed all the information to the police now and they are dealing with it.”

The damage forced pupils, aged between four and 11, to miss their last morning swimming lesson before they broke up for the summer holidays – but the centre was able to reopen by Saturday afternoon.

“The parents were very understanding, but obviously the kids were disappointed,” added Mr Walker.

Luckily the centre’s coffee shop and gymnasium, which last year had a £100,000 revamp, were unharmed during the incident.

Police are appealing to anyone who saw anything suspicious around Stones Lane on Friday night or early Saturday morning to contact them.

PC Lee Kuklinski said: “It is still an ongoing investigation. We have a number of lines of enquiry that we are following up, including CCTV images. But we would appreciate information from members of the public.”

Anyone with information should call police on 101 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.