A DOCTOR who had one year’s worth of study notes stolen from her car in Kew has had them returned by a good Samaritan - thanks to the Guardian.

Dr Melita Brownrigg was delighted to get the research back after the documents were spotted by an eagle-eyed resident, who had seen her appeal in the June 12 edition of the paper.

She is studying for an MA degree and has spent one year compiling the research for a 15,000-word dissertation, so she was devastated when all her notes were taken from her car, outside her sister’s house in Beechwood Avenue, Kew, while she was away in Paris for the weekend.

But the tragedy had a happy ending this week when a resident found the documents discarded by the thief in his front garden and returned them to her.

The good Samaritan was sorting out rubbish in his front garden when he spotted the sheaf of papers.

He was about to throw them away when he saw the words ‘human rights’ on them, and this reminded him of the appeal in the Guardian two weeks earlier.

The finder immediately contacted Dr Brownrigg to return the papers, and even declined the offer of a reward or public recognition for his good deed.

The doctor said she was overjoyed, saying: “He said his pleasure was in finding and returning it.

“The documents had been scattered and rained on, but I’ve found nothing missing. It’s good to see the nice side of human nature.” Another Guardian reader, Dr Philip Cox, from Kew, who had written a dissertation on a similar issue, also offered to share his notes with her.

Before the return of the papers, Dr Brownrigg feared she would have to repeat one year’s worth of research in six weeks. She has to write a dissertation on patients’ rights for her course in medical law and ethics, at King’s College London.

After explaining her plight to the college, they offered her an extension of time, but she was still sure that repeating one year’s work in six weeks would produce a work of far inferior quality, which could damage her eventual degree.

She went for a weekend in Paris to celebrate the end of her exams, leaving her car in Beechwood Avenue, Kew, on Friday, June 6, and returning two days later to find the door had been forced and her satchel, containing the notes, had been stolen.

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