Walking up to work as normal one Saturday afternoon (about 17.30), I walked around a blind bend. I then passed two young black men of whom looked suspicious. I increased my pace, then literally in a couple of seconds I had my ipod snapped from my neck. I reacted straight away by pursuing the two individuals chasing them up a steep hill. I was about to pounce on the closest one to me when he suddenly turned around (by this point I was about 10ft away from him), hauled out an object which turned out to be an axe. I was always concentrating on where the axe was going compared with the suspect’s faces!
As soon as I calculated that this object was an axe I put out my arms and hands in a gesturely manner as to say "ok ... take the ipod ... just leave me to live" (thank you very much). At that same time the suspect was hauling abusive verbal commands at me as well as hauling the axe above his left shoulder (my right) as if he was going to do some very serious damage!
After they turned and ran off with my ipod, in a state of absolute shock, I quickly turned around (swiftly). Whilst turning around I noticed that a mobile phone had been dropped by one of the suspects; so I crabbed it and shoved it in my left hand trouser pocket.
I then started to very quickly walk, even jog towards work; mainly wanting to get into public view. On the way I asked a man who was walking his dog if he had seen anyone run by, he answered politely "no". I briefly explained that my ipod had just been violently robbed from me and that I had been consulted with an axe capable of doing serious damage. On my way to work I spotted a fellow friend and work colleague who was on her way to the wooded area where I had just come from, so as a good citizen I warned her of what had happened and explained to her that I was on my way to work to phone the police.
Arriving at work, I went directly to the service desk and phoned the police (about 17.50 / 17.55). By this time I was still in shock and found it hard to fully explain what had happened to me. After being told that someone was on their way I went to put the mobile phone within a clear plastic 'produce' bag (using one other one as a glove). I then went to the admin room to grab some paper to write down what had happened (as much as I could remember).
The police arrived swidty within 20 minutes. Upon arrival the mobile phone was ringing so they ended up answering it making the assumption that the suspects were attempting to find thier lost device. I then was asked to provide writen statement, using the one i already had started to write down.
Three weeks went by before hearing from them again, informing me that they had received numbers from the phone which they were looking into and that they were going to start visiting certain addresses.
After another two weeks I got called into ID them, even though I explained to the police that I was concentrating on where the axe was going rather than their faces. I stressed that I could remember features such as thier build and height etc.
Whilst going through the ordeal I was absolutly petrified about the whole idea of ID'ing them. During the ID parade I couldn't get a 100% ID on the first suspect; but the second one I was 100% sure. A day later, about to go into my last lecture of the day I received a call explaining that I had picked out the wrong one and that they couldn't take it further. I had to get off the phone due to me having a lecture so simply said fair enough and then the detective ended putting the phone down, without saying goodbye or apologising.
I asked myself "What kind of justice is this? I get told that it is only a 'facial' ID parade" which seems very unfair still.
I pray to god that the next victim(s) are as bright as me (as in they don't try and fight them).
