Scott Hibbert

A would-be robber who was foiled by an air freshener-wielding pensioner has been locked up.

Scott Hibberts, aged 21, targeted the 70-year-old man at his home in Huntington, near Cannock.

The retired dustbin man opened his door to the masked, knife-wielding thug at around 9.45pm on September 6 last year. But the pensioner fought back.

The man, whose home has been a repeated target for thieves, picked up the nearest thing to him – a can of Wilkinson’s Citrus Fresh spray – and blasted his assailant in the face. He then ran off.

Minutes earlier, Hibberts, of Sycamore Way, Cannock, had waved a craft knife in the face of a neighbour of the pensioner, shouting and demanding money.

The father-of-two told her she should “remember his face”, but she was able to shut the door on him, Mr Stephen Redmond, prosecuting, told Stafford Crown Court yesterday.

He said Hibberts had been carrying out guttering work for the woman and her husband, but had been sacked because his work was not up to standard.

Hibberts was jailed for 40 months by a judge, after he admitted two counts of attempted robbery and a further two of possessing a bladed article.

His solicitor, Mr Walter Bealby, told the court the botched raids were “amateurish in the extreme.”

He said his client had been drinking at the time of the offences and needed money to pay his debts.

“Whatever he thought about the money being owed, this was not the way to go about it,” he added.

Recorder Miss Sally Hancox told the pensioner: “You should be commended for his bravery in picking up an air freshener and spraying it in your eyes.”

Addressing Hibberts, she said: “You have preyed upon victims who were each in their way vulnerable.

“Within the space of minutes you terrorised two households.”