A ROBBER has been jailed for snatching a mother’s shopping as she walked home by the River Ouse in York.

Richard Smith’s actions sparked a chase by an off-duty fireman and police officers that ended with the robber evading all his pursuers in the streets off Boroughbridge Road, York Crown Court heard.

He jettisoned some of his loot, his bicycle and some of his clothing during his successful escape and, when he was arrested the next day, blamed his innocent cousin.

But CCTV evidence showed he was lying, and on the day he was due to stand trial at York Crown Court he pleaded guilty to robbery.

Recorder Eric Elliott QC told Smith: “I am going to have to send you away. You have come to the end of the road.”

Smith, 20, of Dane Avenue, Acomb, was jailed for nine months.

Louise Reevell, prosecuting, said Pauline Williams, 52, was walking home with her daughter after a shopping trip last year along the Cinders Lane foot and cycle path between the city centre and the Leeman Road area when Smith rode up behind them and grabbed her shopping bags.

Despite her efforts to hold on to them, Smith pulled them from her hands and rode off.

But off-duty fireman Paul Warnock was also cycling along the river and gave chase, calling to the women to ring 999. He pursued Smith past St Barnabas’s Church and into Salisbury Road, where Smith discarded a handbag and shopping bag in an alleyway.

Police officers spotted Smith as he turned uphill out of Salisbury Road and continued the chase.

David Hall, for Smith, said his client needed money for cannabis because he was depressed.

He worked as and when he could and had lost his last job when he went out to have a smoke.

The robbery had been opportunistic, he said.