Monday, December 07, 2009

Woman turned to crime to sate houmous habit

Police have revealed the 4x4 vehicle which smashed into the premises of the former Natural Café in Petersfield High Street was being used in a so-called ‘houmous-ram raid’.

The woman responsible, Jocasta Bull-Bars, 43, from Godalming, has admitted she felt obligated to do something drastic after her family was ‘devastated by the credit crunch’.

In an exclusive interview with Petersfield Newswire, following her release, she said: “My husband is an independent financial advisor and owns a string of businesses across the south-east – and naturally he’s been very heavily impacted by the economic downturn.

“His bonuses for the last two years have only just made six figures and that has had a detrimental effect on all the family. For example, during the summer holidays we had to make the decision to take our least-intelligent child out of the private school system and put him in a state school.

“By making huge sacrifices we are able to continue to provide private education for the other five, but at some cost. We’ve had to sell one of our holiday homes, lay off some of the domestic staff, stop Matilda’s daily horse-riding lessons, my husband Giles has had to amend his golf-club membership to five-day, and, in January, we all have to fly economy to the chalet in Klosters.

“It’s all the fault of this Government – they don’t seem to realise the effect it has on normal people like us.”

Mrs Bull-Bars, a full-time tennis pupil, continued: “We were devastated by the credit crunch and I began to wonder how I was going to put houmous, sun-blanched tomatoes and Bollinger on the table for the kids to eat when they came home from boarding school at the end of every term.

“I decided to take the desperate step of ram-raiding a health-food restaurant after the idea had been given to me by a bridge partner at the tennis club who had used her Humvee to ram-raid Body Shop, in Farnham, in a desperate effort to provide her family with fruit-scented soaps.

“Sadly for me, the Government’s lack of economic forethought and mismanagement forced the closure of the Natural Café around a year ago, and none of the staff here bothered to tell me.

“Naturally I feel awful. It was a moment of madness; after all I can’t claim on the insurance for a ram-raid. I gave it no thought whatsoever.”

Police in Petersfield have confirmed Mrs Bull-Bars received only a caution owing to diminished reality and the fact her father, a High Court judge, instructed them so to do.

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