A Carlisle robber who snatched a grieving widow’s handbag at dawn, yards from a police station, has been jailed.
The 62-year-old victim was at a Shadygrove Road bus stop in the Raffles area on a planned first day of work as a cleaner at a doctor’s surgery.
At 5.41am on August 13, she was approached by John McPherson, 38.
McPherson rode past her on a bike and said a cheery good morning to the woman, who felt uneasy, Carlisle Crown Court heard today.
McPherson reappeared, rode up to her on the bike and then grabbed her right arm and wrist before taking hold of her handbag.
In a struggle, the woman banged her hand against the bus stop as McPherson snatched the bag and rode off.
The bag contained the woman’s mobile phone, bank cards in the names of her and her late husband, passport, driving licence and almost £200 cash.
The woman attempted unsuccessfully to rouse police at the nearby police station. Passers-by stopped to help and officers were alerted.
McPherson’s partner arrived on scene with first the handbag — minus its contents — and then shortly after the woman’s mobile phone.
McPherson was identified as the robber and had committed the robbery to pay off a drug debt and buy alcohol, it emerged.
In an impact statement, the woman told how her husband had died 18 months earlier. They had previously worked together at Carlisle’s Pirelli factory, although she later found herself unable to remain there. She instead found work as a cleaner and was on her way to a new job, carrying identity documents, but had not been able to take that position in the aftermath of the robbery.
“It required her to work and travel between four and eight in the morning,” observed Judge Nicholas Barker. “The trauma of being on the street at that time of the morning, on her own, in the dark, meant she lost all her confidence.”
All that the woman now had was her dog. And she said of McPherson: “I just feel like he has taken everything off me. Even when I am in the house now I double-check that all my doors are locked. I am too scared to even open the windows.
“I just can’t believe he did this right next to the police station.”
McPherson, now of Newtown Close, Carlisle, admitted robbery.
Barrister Kim Whittlestone, mitigating, said heavily-convicted McPherson had been out of trouble since 2018 but relapsed into an alcohol addiction earlier this year.
A probation service pre-sentence report detailed trauma he had witnessed as a child, and of his subsequent vulnerability and manipulation by others.
“He did not target this lady,” said Miss Whittlestone. “He did not know who she was. He is remorseful for that and would wish for his apologies to be passed on to her.”
Judge Barker imposed an immediate 32-month jail term.
“The nature of these random attacks is that you do not know and cannot know the circumstances of the person you are about to rob,” said the judge. “They may be very strong and resilient or they may not be. Because of the very sad sequence of events in her (the victim’s) life, she was not resilient.”
McPherson was also banned from contacting the woman for five years.
