A man who chased off thieves who were trying to drill into his van in broad daylight in Rotherhithe has called the area “a real hotspot for chancers”.
Paul Torode, who works as a courier around London as well as running a media company, parked his van on Rotherhithe Street between the Blacksmiths Arms pub and the Hilton hotel, briefly to visit a shop on the morning of Tuesday June 22.
As he came back out of the shop a few minutes later he was startled to see two men with power drills trying to get into the back of his van. He immediately started shouting and ran towards them – causing the two criminals to flee.
Paul called the police. Officers said they were investigating but no arrests had been made yet.
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“This is a big part of my livelihood, so if the van had been stolen it would have been a big deal,” he said. “I think they were actually looking for tools, which I don’t have, and the van was completely empty anyway.
“In a way I would get it more if it was overnight. But you can only be wary up to a certain point. At a certain level the vans are going to be vulnerable because you can’t be in them the whole time. I have to leave it sometimes. I popped into the shop for five minutes, maybe less.”
Paul recently moved to Dartford in Kent, but lived in the Rotherhithe area for a long time. “I don’t think [the thieves] give a sh*t at the moment,” he said. “It’s completely rife. It’s really bad at the moment, probably partly because there’s so much construction.
“It’s a real hotspot for any chancers, it’s like a 9-5 job at the minute.”
Thanks to his own bravery and quick thinking, Paul’s van was left mostly intact but he still had to pay for the holes the men drilled to be repaired, which did not come cheap.
“The job’s half done now so any half decent criminal could come along and finish it off!”, he joked.