Raiders Attack Strand on the Green Post Office

Three people on mopeds break in but get little for their efforts

The post office on Strand on the Green was broken into by a gang of three people in the early hours of Bank Holiday Monday (28 August).

The postmistress Mrs Joshi was asleep upstairs when she was awoken by a loud bang and then the alarm going off. She saw three people with crash helmets riding two motorbikes.

Thankfully after a couple of minutes they all rode off towards the Grove Park area. Mrs Joshi’s son Milan believes that this was because there is nothing of notable value in the shop (i.e. no cash till, cigarettes, alcohol, perfumes or expensive stock) and the shop alarm is deafening when triggered.

The trio could not get through the glass on the door as it did not shatter. In any event, there are steel bars behind the glass even if they had managed to break the glass. However, after a lot of effort they did break the lock on the door and once in the shop they went for the cigarette shutter but the contents were empty as they have been for many years.

The police arrived very quickly once the alarm went off and a forensics team appeared soon afterwards.

Milan said, “We've had the shop door secured with new locks. My mum is ok but, understandably, was shaken up and needed some strong cups of tea to settle her nerves.”

This is not the first time that the post office has been hit. Mrs Joshi has already had to overcome the trauma of having two armed robberies in 2007, including watching a thief putting a gun to her customer’s head.

There was a similar incident a short distance away in Brentford the same morning at a convenience store. The police were called at 3.55am to reports of a males with mopeds breaking into the store on London Road.

The three suspects, all wearing helmets, were on two black/dark coloured mopeds, one of which was used to ram the front door to gain entry. The suspects stole a quantity of cash and a cigarettes/tobacco and are understood to have fled the scene on London Road towards Kew Bridge before police arrived.

Any witnesses, or anyone with any information, can contact police via 101, or via Twitter @MetCC.

To give information anonymously call Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111 or visit crimestoppers-uk.org.

August 29, 2017