A have-a-go hero mum has been left with a broken shoulder after trying to stop a thief making off with her fiance’s work tools – by jumping onto the bonnet of his CAR.
Lena Mcmaster, 33, leapt into action in a car park on Saturday after spotting the opportunist thief nicking expensive power tools from fiance Marcus Quigley’s van.
Mum-of-two Lena jumped onto the bonnet of the man’s car – but claims he looked right at her before accelerating away and sent her flying.
Lena, from Gloucester, Glos., has been left with a broken shoulder in three places after the incident in the car park of home and garden store The Range, in Eastern Avenue, Gloucester, at 1pm on Saturday.
Lena, who is mum to a four-year-old daughter and one-year-old son, said the man had made off with about £1,000 worth of power tools from Marcus’ work van.
She tearfully said: “It’s disgusting. From what’s been put on social media, it seems we’re not the only people to have this happen to. It’s happened a lot.
“He must have seen me fly off the car and to not stop for a few tools…,” she added.
Lena, who works in the kitchens at University of Gloucestershire’s Oxstalls campus, realised something was amiss when she and Marcus left The Range to see one of the van’s doors was open.
It was about 1pm and they had caught a man in the act of stealing the tools, by loading them into his car.
Lena shouted at him, though she later regretted this because she said it alerted him to their presence, and Marcus ran towards him before he got into his vehicle.
Determined not to let him get away, Lena jumped onto the bonnet of his car.
She said: “I looked him dead in the eyes and he just looked at me and put his foot on the accelerator.
“I came flying off and ripped his windscreen wiper off as that was what I was hanging onto.”
Lena landed on the ground on her right shoulder, and was in such pain that she could not move.
She was taken to Gloucestershire Royal Hospital where, after a wait of about four hours, she was told her shoulder was broken in three places.
The traumatic incident has left her in great discomfort and wondering how she will physically manage looking after her children.
Tearfully talking about the matter, she said it had come at a particularly difficult time as her youngest son is really poorly and there were preparations for Christmas to take care of.
She said: “We do everything by the book and struggle to get by. It’s really hard. We both work and have little kids.”
She thought the vehicle the thief was driving was a silver people carrier, possibly a Citroen Picasso.
A spokeswoman for Gloucestershire police said anyone with information about the incident should call 101, quoting incident 221 of December 14.