A WHEELCHAIR stolen from a disabled boy has been found dumped at a school.

Friends of Thomas Whiley's parents found the wheelchair in the grounds of Mansbridge Primary School in Southampton.

Mum and dad Tracey, 39, and Robert, 51, a warehouse operative for Tesco, had appealed for the wheelchair to be returned through the Daily Echo.

Now, after picking up the wheelchair, they believe it is a write-off.

"Both wheels are buckled," said Tracey, a learning support assistant at Cantell School in Bassett.

Thieves stole the family's Ford Escort, with Thomas's wheelchair in the boot, from outside their home in Greenlea Crescent, Bassett, on February 5.

Two days later police recovered the car in Brookside Way, Swaythling, but both the wheelchair and disabled blue badge in the windscreen had been taken.

"I still don't understand why they did it," said Tracey. "Whoever took the wheelchair from the car must have realised it belonged to a little boy."

The wrecked wheelchair has been returned to the firm which supplied it to the Whiley family.

A new replacement manual wheelchair is due to arrive for 11-year-old Thomas, who has Lowe's Syndrome and is mentally and physically disabled, within the next few days.