Battling Kelly routs a mugger

Oct 24 2003 Exclusive By Roisin Gad El Rab Chester Chronicle

A YOUNG woman took the law into her own hands when a mugger snatched her bag.

Kelly Davis chased and caught the thief, who tamely handed it back.

She was fuelled by the anger from an incident a month ago when she and her boyfriend had £400 stolen from them on the day they were going on holiday.

'I was angry and tired of being a victim,' she said. 'There was no-one there to see, no-one there to help. I wasn't scared but I know the mugger could have hurt me.'

Kelly, who works at MBNA, had stopped to have her lunch on a bench at the coach station on Delamere Street, Chester.

She said: 'It was my day off and I went to get my phone fixed. It was just before payday and I didn't have much money. I went to get a pie and sat down in the coach station because it was sheltered.'

Kelly, of Hoole, became aware of a man talking loudly behind her. She thought nothing of it and turned to see if he was on a mobile phone.

'I had my hand wrapped around the strap of my bag and was brushing crumbs off my clothes,' she said. 'As I turned, my arms came off the bag and the guy was looking in my direction. I wondered what he was doing and suddenly I felt there was someone else there but I couldn't see him. The next thing I knew, my bag was gone.'

She looked down and saw a man under the bench.

'He looked about 28 to 30 with dark hair, but not like a down-and-out, or high on drugs, more like any other guy,' she said.

Kelly immediately ran after her assailant. She said: 'He didn't get far, about 50 yards, when he lost his footing. He slipped and I caught right up with him, not quite sure what I was going to do next.

'I was going to reach into his coat and take my bag, but he looked up at me, took my bag from his coat and held it up. His expression was a bit moronic - it was like 'fair cop'.

'I wasn't scared. I just wasn't going to let him have my bag. I snatched it off him and shouted a little more.

'He shouted over his shoulder: 'You should look after your stuff then, shouldn't you.' I shouted after him: 'Why should working people like us have to worry every moment about what you take from us next?'