Maybe they thought it snapped a photo of them so they were removing the evidence without actually stealing the camera?

It'll do you no good to express yourself to them. People like that don't care. I was on another site where a guy was having problems with trespassers, so he got one of the Moultrie's that you can subscribe to a service that sends the pics directly to your cell phone when they are taken. One day he got a pic and sure enough, it showed the neighbors crossing the property line. He called the sheriff and they caught them ON the property, and with photo evidence were able to nail them on a fistful of violations.