An Irish shopkeeper in Bermuda repelled a masked robber from his hardware store with an axe to protect his wife next door.
Michael Joseph Forde, from Mayo, said he usually has a hurley stick beside the till but he could not reach it, so he grabbed the hatchet.
The defiant ex-builder said: “I don’t care if they come in a tank. It’s our business and we are not handing it over.”
He revealed that the robber ordered him to fill a plastic bag with cash whilst threatening him with concealed a weapon that appeared to resemble a firearm.
But Mick decided that the man was bluffing about having a gun during the scare on New Year’s Eve — so he locked his cash register, threw away the keys, and armed himself.
Axe-wielding Mick then confronted the would-be robber and sent him scurrying empty-handed out of the shop.
He said: “I figured if he had a gun, he would have shown it.
“I realised he was not a customer, but there to rob. I didn’t say anything. I just locked the register and took the key and threw it.
“It wasn’t fear. I’m not being boastful, I was just shocked, but I had a couple of extra seconds to process what was going on.”
When the intruder turned away from Mick to recover the till keys, Mick grabbed the axe and said: “That’s when he [the robber] changed his mind.”
Mick’s store sign for his shop Bargain Hunters, which is adjacent to his home, proudly displays a shamrock in Ireland’s colours.
He added: “I’m not saying we can’t be robbed, but they’re not getting our money and that’s the bottom line.
“My wife, Bernadette, was at home next door. We started this store five years ago and built our business from scratch.
“I had made up my mind, anybody tried to rob us, the first thing I would do is go to the register and lock it,” he told a Bermuda news outlet.
Bernadette said: “Mike came home and told me, ‘Don’t panic, but we just had an attempted robbery’.
“I panicked. When I saw the video of what happened, my mouth just dropped.
“We have worked hard to build this store up. This is our life and someone is just going to try and take it?”
The ordeal was recorded on CCTV, which police in Bermuda are investigating.
Detective Inspector Clifford Roberts of the Criminal Investigative Unit warned Mick not to resist assailants due to a “significant risk of serious injury or worse”.
Police said a man whose face was covered entered Mick’s store just after 2pm on December 31.
They said the man may have been spotted by eye-witnesses.
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