Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
LOCKED IN OUR OWN HOME BY BURGLARS
Medication, phones and keys stolen
A COUPLE were locked inside their home by a burglar who had ransacked the property as they slept upstairs.
The incident happened around 5.30am yesterday morning at Crumlin Gardens off Twaddell Avenue, North Belfast.
Medication for arthritis, including Lyrica and Methotrexate which sells readily on the black market, was taken along with phones, house, van and car keys, a £500 diving watch and a purses.
The householder’s van was started and crashed into a neighbour’s wall before being abandoned in the road where it remained this morning. The owners were woken by their Rottweiller dog, Hatchie.
The woman’s daughter told the Mirror: “The dog was growling and my mum’s husband looked outside to see someone sitting in the passenger seat of his van.
“He started shouting through the window and when he ran downstairs the place had been ransacked and they were both locked inside and all the keys had been taken. The dog was going mad outside trying to get into the house.
“Whoever was in the house took practically everything they could get their hands on. They took all my mum’s medication which she keeps in a large sweetie tin and they dumped the tin.
“They took money and dumped the bank cards and the purses, they took every mobile phone in the house. They left the laptop so at least mum was able to cancel her cards. My mum’s husband called the police on the landline and they arrived about 7.30am. “Whoever did this started the van and reversed it into our friend’s wall. They abandoned the van and its still stuck in the road and no one has been able to get past it yet.”
A PSNI spokesman said: “It is believed entry was gained to the property shortly after 5.30am and items including a sum of cash stolen. Anyone with information is asked to call 101.”