MAY I refer to Eliot Grange's letter in the Adver April 23 headlined "The police were of no help to me." I can assure him that he is not alone.

About ten years back I had a bit of trouble with a paedophile who struck his wife on the head with a hammer outside a bank in the main street and then said he would hit my wife with a hammer when he got out of prison.

He had also assaulted his own girls.

No woman walking a small dog was safe so when he started to say what he would do to my daughter I thought I would tell the police (not the Wiltshire police.) They told me to go and see his probation officer, who told me what time he would be let out of prison.

He didn't turn up so I kept looking for him.

And one day I saw his Skoda outside an electrical shop, he was just getting in the car.

Being an ex-Boy Scout I helped him in, then I helped him out with my left hand clamped on his throat.

The shopkeeper came out of the shop and said: "Can you let him go mate? No one is coming in the shop."

I said: "Do you know who I have hold of here? It's the local pervert, and this is just the start if he gives me any more trouble."

Surprise - the local police were more interested in charging me than they were in charging him.

As for thugs, you won't control them by saying "don't be a naughty boy."

If Feltham is full try putting them in the Army glass house in Hydrabad barracks, in Colchester.

They ran us about there in 1944 and it would do them the world of good.

A THIPTHORPE.

Swindon