A child agency support worker says she was spied on by an elderly peeping tom in the toilets of a Black Country pizza restaurant.

Sam Hinton, aged 22, was also hit with the pensioner’s walking stick after she confronted him outside Pizza Hut at Dudley’s Merry Hill Centre.

The matter was reported to police who confirmed they are investigating the allegation and are treating the attack on Miss Hinton as a wounding.

Miss Hinton, who lives in Wealdstone Drive, Milking Bank, Dudley, said she was out shopping with her mother and aunt when she visited toilets at the restaurant next to the bus station.

She looked up and says she saw someone peering over the top of the cubicle.

“I was shocked especially when I realised it was an elderly man,” she said.

“It was an invasion of my privacy and it makes me feel sick to think about it, you expect to be safe when using restaurant facilities in a busy shopping centre.

“What worries me is that it could have been a child who he spied on. It has left me feeling quite down.”

Miss Hinton, who works at the Waterfront in Brierley Hill, today said she wanted to warn other women to be on their guard following her ordeal last Thursday.

She ran after the pensioner and tried to stop him but he struck her with his walking stick cutting her lip.

Security staff at Merry Hill were called but the man got away. A spokeswoman for Pizza Hut said: “We were concerned to hear about this incident as we take security of our customers and staff very seriously.”