A TRAIL of vandalised vehicles has sparked fears that an eco-fanatic is targeting four-wheel-drive cars in Oxford.

Builder Phillip Bradley has seen his new £25,000 Isuzu attacked outside his home on Osney Island four times, leaving him with a £1,700 repair bill.

Over the last three weeks his vehicle has been vandalised three times.

Another 4x4 owner living nearby has also had the windscreen of his Toyota Hilux repeatedly smashed since January.

People living on Osney Island have been shocked by the level of car vandalism in recent weeks, with the damage always wreaked at weekends in the early hours of the morning.

Residents are convinced that the vandalism is not random, with the offender returning again and again to damage expensive four-wheel-drive vehicles.

One owner on Osney Island has now taken to sleeping in his vehicle at night in the hope of catching the vandal. And he has also had CCTV cameras put in front of his house.

Mr Bradley said his Isuzu Denver Rodeo was first damaged just two days after he bought it in October, when the windscreen was smashed. The car had been parked outside his home in West Street.

The last attack on his car happened on Friday night when the windscreen was again smashed and the bonnet pierced, apparently with a heavy metal spike.

Mr Bradley, a father of two who owns the building firm Attics+, said he was disturbed at 4am by a loud smashing noise. He had been sleeping in the front bedroom of his house to keep watch over his vehicle. But the offender had fled down Swan Street by the time he had rushed to his car.

Mr Bradley said: “I had thought I was the victim of some personal vendetta when it first happened. But then I heard about another guy in East Street having his 4x4 damaged.

“I do not believe we are talking about youngsters who have been to the clubs, or the hooded crew. This seems to be someone who is on a mission. It is someone who is going to keep on coming back until he is caught.

“My guess is that it is someone who perceives cars like mine to be gas guzzlers.

“One of the neighbours say they saw a male in his thirties walking away.”

The owner of the vandalised Toyota Hilux is Ian Beesley, also a builder, who lives on Ferry Hinksey Road.

Mr Beesley, widely known as Digger, said his car had been parked in a small car park only yards from his home when it was vandalised.

He also feared that a green fanatic was the most likely culprit He said: “The fact that it occurs at about 4am in the morning certainly suggests that this is not being done by kids.”

Mr Beesley won national fame after being prosecuted for digging up a speed control hump outside his house, because the noise from lorries going over it was keeping him awake at night.