Husband and wife businessmen fend off a robber who staggers off and takes a young woman’s car

A couple successfully defended their shop from a thief who then staggered down the road and drove off with a young woman’s car after she was distracted by his accomplice. Curtis Rowe and the other man were caught on CCTV while drunk and high at 7am in the Leicester Food and Wines store in Welford Road, Leicester city centre.

Both men wandered around the store picking up items and placing them on the counter, including bread and breakfast cereal. The accomplice tried to enter a private area of ​​the building and the male trader went to stop him while his wife was at the checkout.

A confrontation then ensued involving the male salesman and Rowe, 45, who repeatedly grabbed the middle-aged man’s neck in an attempt to steal his gold chain. Rowe then went to take items from the counter and put them in his pockets and continuously pushed the male shopkeeper who was trying to stop him.

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The woman then pulled a baseball bat from behind the counter and threw it at Rowe, then rushed to help her husband push the two men out the door. The drunken men made a brief attempt to force their way back inside, but then gave up and headed for nearby King Street.

In King Street, the young woman was behind the wheel of her parked car with the engine running, putting an address into the sat nav, when Rowe’s accomplice opened the passenger door and took her bag from the passenger seat and ran off with her. It contained £100 in cash and bank cards.

She got out to give chase, and as she did, Rowe jumped behind the wheel and drove off. He drove the car around the corner – about 350 meters away – and got out, took a lot of her belongings from the trunk of the vehicle and drove off with them.

He Rowe obtained the woman’s bank cards from his accomplice and made two attempts to buy a £96 bottle of spirits from a nearby off-licence. But the cards had already been canceled by the young woman so the attempts were unsuccessful.

He was arrested by Leicestershire Police and later pleaded guilty to attempted robbery, taking a vehicle without consent and two counts of attempted fraud. He appeared at Leicester Crown Court for sentencing this week.

The incidents took place on Wednesday November 15 last year and the court heard that at the time Rowe, of Ipswich Close, Beaumont Leys, Leicester, already had convictions for 52 previous offences, including robbery. He was on post-release supervision from a previous prison sentence when the latest crimes were committed.

His offending stopped in 2011 when he started a serious relationship, but started again in 2020 after he was stabbed and started using cocaine to numb the pain, which led to his relationship breaking up.

Priya Bakshi, representing Rowe, said the two men did not enter the store with the intention of taking anything. She said: “There was no intention from the start – he lost his temper, wrong.”

She added that the carjacking was not a coordinated effort by the two men, but an opportunistic crime after the young woman followed the other man drinking. She said her client was “calm and shy” when sober and only committed the crimes because he was drunk and high.

Judge William Harbage KC said the experiences had been terrifying for the traders and the young woman. He said the worst offense was trying to grab the merchant’s gold chain.

He said: “You started to grab him by the throat. You made repeated grabs, trying to reach his gold chain.

“You failed, but the chain was broken. He was very scared and said anything could have happened and he saw you both doing drugs.

“It must have been extremely scary. Shopkeepers in this type of store are very vulnerable to this type of attack.”

Rowe was sentenced to three years in prison. The court heard that Rowe’s accomplice had previously pleaded guilty to theft and was awaiting sentence.