A FEARLESS Army veteran has told how he sent a burglar packing as the crook tried to raid his Midland home.

Great-grandad John Dance, aged 73, grabbed a pick axe handle and broke the nose of prolific offender Lemuel Gibbs – causing him to spill blood which provided crucial DNA evidence for his conviction.

Gibbs, 33, of Jockey Road, Sutton Coldfield, was jailed for three years at Warwick Crown Court after he pleaded guilty to five burglaries, included the raid on Mr Dance’s home.

Mr Dance – who served with the Army in Cyprus in the 1950s – realised that his home, in Bradford Road, Castle Bromwich, was being burgled when he arrived at his front door and saw glass shattered across the floor.

He could also hear rummaging upstairs.

He said he quickly grabbed a pickaxe handle, which his son had told him to keep by the front door “just in case”, before the intruder came downstairs towards him.

“He was going to attack me so I swung the handle and it caught him,” said Mr Dance. “I was not that fussed about confronting him.

“I think it might have had something to do with being in the Army.

“It was very upsetting though and I do keep having flashbacks of what happened.