Odd vandal dubbed the “Superglue Bandit” gluing padlocks of Scots businesses

The man, who appears to be in his late 30s, targeted several businesses in Edinburgh last week, both in broad daylight and at night.

CCTV captured a man approaching events venue The Biscuit Factory on two separate occasions – at around 7.35pm on 3 Jan and 9.35am on 6 Jan.

Footage shows him casually strolling up to the venue wearing a black jacket, grey scarf, blue jeans and trainers and fiddling with something in his hands.

He disappears out of shot into the alcove of the door for about 15 seconds then nonchalantly walks away after taking a quick glance around.

Security discovered that the entry keypad had been superglued shut, but were able to salvage the lock in this instance.

Three days later, during broad daylight, CCTV captured the same person approaching the same door where a padlock was later found to be super-glued.

Staff from Pure Offices across the road were also unable to access their carpark after finding the padlock to their gates super-glued on Tuesday morning.

Workers from the venue had to get bolt-cutters to cut through the padlock so they could get into the building.

Edinburgh Woolen Mill, and arts business and several other units in the area complained about their locks being glued up last week too.

Business owners have been left baffled by the reasoning behind the incidents from the man dubbed locally as the “Superglue Bandit”.

A spokeswoman for The Biscuit Factory today said: “It has all been very weird with our serial-super-gluer.

“It’s absolute madness. I’m finding it rather funny now, but it certainly wasn’t at the time.

“I believe he glued an arts centre and a print centre locally also, and some units round the corner from us on Bangor Road.

“The footage shows he is older and well-dressed, so he doesn’t really fit the hooligan demographic, which makes it even stranger.

“In the first bit of footage you see him walk right past the camera screwing the lid back on his tube.

“However, in the next clip he is covered over and has also upgraded from a normal tube of superglue to an adhesive spray which sets much faster, so he is getting wiser.

“We have reported to the police on both occasions, and they were going to share his image on Friday but haven’t, so I wonder if they maybe caught up with him.”

The spokeswoman added: “On his first visit, our security luckily arrived to lock up and were able to save the lock before the glue set.

“However when he came back on the morning of the 6th, he had used adhesive and this set immediately, preventing access.

“Luckily, we were already inside and had opened the other access point, so it didn’t cause too much of an issue.”

The spokeswoman then revealed that the doors that were stuck as a result of the vandal were actually fire doors.

She said: “The doors that he did glue are a fire escape, and we have 32 businesses inhouse who could easily have been locked in or out with this being our main point of access.”

A spokeswoman for Pure Offices Ltd today said: “It’s just bizarre. The guy looks to be in his 30s or 40s, he’s not a kid.

“He super-glued the keyhole of the lock, and there was absolutely no way to get it open so we ended up having to get someone with bolt cutters to come and break it open.

“Replacing that padlock alone costs us about £100 for a heavy duty one. I’m not sure what he gets out of it, it’s really just the oddest thing.”

An office worker from the same building said: “It was strange, the gates are always open but when I turned up for work on Tuesday the padlock was still on.

“Another office worker from the building was walking in at the same time and was confused as to why it wasn’t open either as staff use the car park daily.

“It was only after chatting to people that we found out that it was some middle-aged man who had been targeting local businesses – The Biscuit Factory got hit.

“He is known now as the ‘Superglue Bandit’. It’s all very odd.”

A spokeswoman for Police Scotland today said: “Officers are carrying out enquiries into reckless conduct after locks were super-glued at a business premises in Anderson Place in Edinburgh recently.

“Anyone who knows who is responsible should contact Police Scotland on 101, quoting 1689 of 4 January, 2022.”