A TAXI driver was held up at gunpoint by a thug who threatened to shoot him if he didn’t hand over cash.

But the brave York cabbie - a champion saloon driver - put his foot down and blasted his horn with the armed raider still in the car in a bid to raise the alarm.

Colin Metcalfe was waiting at traffic lights in Haxby Road at just before midnight on Sunday when a man got into the back of his cab and threatened him with a handgun.

York Press:

Mr Metcalfe, 53, said: “I told him I was on my way to a job. He said ‘I want your money’, and when I looked again, he had a gun in his hand and said ‘I want your money or I’ll shoot you’. With that, I put my foot down.”

Seeing the road was almost empty, Mr Metcalfe - who is a champion sprint driver in modified saloons - drove at speed along Clarence Street and Gillygate, keeping his hand on the vehicle’s horn to draw attention to himself.

He said: “He started saying ‘stop the car, I’ll shoot you, give me the money’. We got into Gillygate and he tried opening the door. If he’d jumped out at that speed, he would have killed himself.”

Mr Metcalfe stopped outside The De Grey Rooms, at which point the gunman got out and ran in the opposite direction. After alerting fellow drivers by radio, he followed the gunman, then flagged down an unmarked police vehicle and alerted them to what happened.

He said: “It wasn’t until Bootham that I realised what had happened. When police came I started to shake a bit, I must have been running on adrenaline to start with.

“I don’t want it to happen to any other driver in York. It was a horrendous experience. I’ve driven in York for over 34 years and this is the first time anyone’s threatened me with a weapon, let alone a gun.”

Mr Metcalfe was back at work at 2am this morning, and said he would not allow himself to be afraid of the gunman, but he wanted drivers across the city to be cautious and lock their doors on journeys.

He said: “I’m sure I could identify him and I would be happy to stand in front of him, not behind a screen.

“It could have been 25 people in the back of my car with guns, but I’m not going to be bullied. I just don’t want it to happen to anyone else.”

Saf Din, chairman of the York Hackney Carriage Drivers’ Association, said he was “very concerned” about the incident, adding the association “will provide all support and help we can”.

He said: “I’m very, very concerned for the safety of all drivers, my own and private hire. We do a vulnerable job.

“I’ve had my taxi driver licence for 21 years and I’ve never heard of a gun being used before. I’ve been headbutted, and heard of knife incidents, but I’ve never known a gun attack in York. I didn’t think this is how things were in York. If we were in a rougher part of the country, perhaps, but not in York. We’re an affluent area, this is unheard of. We don’t have gun crime in York, it’s a beautiful and wonderful city.”

A spokeswoman for North Yorkshire Police said the force was investigating the attempted armed robbery, and urged anyone with information or who saw anything suspicious to contact them.

The spokeswoman said information should be passed as “a matter of urgency” to police on 101 or to Crimestoppers, anonymously, on 0800 555111 quoting reference 12170083262.