A WOMAN pursued two teenage thieves in her car after they stole her vital handbag.

Lisa Buckley was in the front room of her mother's home in Scar View Road, Oxenholme, when her handbag was taken from her car parked outside.

The 42-year-old had left the windows of her Peugeot Estate slightly open after taking the family dogs out for a walk last Friday morning.

Mum Pauline Rowley, 74, spotted the teenagers hanging around and saw one remove the bag from its place on the passenger-side floor.

Miss Buckley, a registered carer, went outside and the teenagers hurried away with one putting the handbag under his T-shirt.

She said: "I just thought, I better go after him, so I got in the car. I would have run after them but I had these platform shoes on.

"My bag has everything in - my mobile phone, bank cards, jewellery and some stuff of my dad's, who is in a nursing home. I was so incensed they had the cheek to take it."

Miss Buckley followed the teenagers. One peeled off to hide behind a car while the other kept walking.

She said: "I stopped the car and said give me my bleeping bag back!'

He stopped and stood there and just looked at me, I don't know what was going on in his mind."

Miss Buckley watched as the teenager then retrieved the handbag from a nearby garden and handed it back through the open window, saying: "Sorry about that."

Back at her mum's house, Miss Buckley called the police, who could not find the offenders, who were last seen heading in the direction of Oxenholme Railway Station.

Mrs Rowley said she was on tenterhooks when her daughter decided to chase after the thieves. "I was sitting here thinking please God, let her get her bag back and don't let them hurt her!" said Mrs Rowley.

Now fully recovered, Miss Buckley said she would do it all again.

"They are two big for their boots these days that they think they can get away with

anything. It was silly of them to steal from outside the front of someone's house when you are sitting there drinking coffee," she said.

Cumbria Police spokesman Mike Smith said standard advice issued by police was to call the police rather than take on offenders.

"But we perfectly understand and recognise that in fast-moving circumstances such as this, people can act on instinct to rightly protect their belongings against theft," he said.

The teenager carrying the bag is described as being around 19-years-old, 5ft 6inches tall with short, dark hair. He was wearing a navy blue T-shirt, trousers and black boots.

The second offender was dressed the same but wearing a baseball cap.

Anyone with information should contact Kendal Police on 01539-722611.

(D3E146PB02)

June 4, 2003 09:30