Woman beats off burglar with gnome

[angelophile]

LONDON, England (AP) -- A grandmother stopped an intruder from entering her home by lobbing a heavy garden gnome at him, police said Friday.

Jean Collop was woken early on Tuesday morning by the sound of an intruder on the roof of her home in Wadebridge, southwest England.

"I grabbed the first thing that came to hand -- one of my garden gnomes -- and hurled it at him, and hit him," she recalled.

"He lay there and I began to scream. I went back into the kitchen and found a rolling pin in case he came down. I didn't want to break another gnome."

A neighbor alerted police who arrived shortly afterward and arrested the intruder.

He added: "Our usual advice would be not to get involved, but to contact the police straight away," said a spokesman for the Devon and Cornwall Police.

"We do appreciate that in the heat of the moment people react to that situation, and if it results in a happy outcome that's great."

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/04/15/britain.gnome.ap/index.html