AddThis SmartLayers

Rookie reporter turns amateur sleuth after hold-up

A suspected robber was photographed by a journalist from the Norwich Evening News as he left the scene of an armed hold-up at a fast food restaurant.

Quick-witted trainee Pete Walsh, who is studying at Hastings, is more used to reporting the news than being part of it.

But when he was on a night out with four friends, he witnessed the hold-up and saw a man rush out of a snack bar in the town chased by staff as the alarm rang out.

And as the shop staff abandoned the chase, the journalists followed in their car, dialed 999 to give a running commentary to the police operator and then took a snap of the man as he tried to get into a nearby house.

The police advised the fast-thinking quartet to make a tactical withdrawal, so they returned to the fast food shop to find a suspect had also been captured on security cameras.

Pete, (25), said: “A man had held a gun up to one of the people in the shop and said ‘give me the money or you’ll get it’, then leapt over the counter when they wouldn’t give him the cash.”

He attacked someone in the shop before fleeing.

“I think we were all a bit shocked that the bloke we had followed, thinking he looked a bit dodgy, had been carrying a gun. We didn’t think about whether he was dangerous or not.”

Do you have a story about the regional press? Ring 0116 227 3122/3121, or
e-mail [email protected]