Exclusive by Sarah Marshall

An elderly woman has been robbed and brutally beaten up in her own home.

A smartly dressed man walked into a sheltered housing block in South Ashford, followed a woman into her flat and stole her handbag, punching her in the face and pulling her to the floor.

The woman, 71-year-old Jean Joyce, has been left with a bruised face, cuts to her knees and an excruciatingly painful break to her upper arm. She will need to use a wheelchair until her injuries heal.

The savage attack happened on Saturday afternoon.

Residents of the block, Oakleigh House in Beaver Lane, are still frightened and, along with Mrs Joyce’s family, are calling for help in identifying the attacker and for better security for sheltered housing units.

Oakleigh House, like other sheltered accommodation in Kent, lost its live-in warden two and a half years ago. A system of ‘floating’ or ‘flying’ wardens drop in daily but have 16 residences dotted around Ashford and Tenterden which they must travel between.

At the time of the cuts, a pensioners’ campaign group said they were a money-saving exercise, but Ashford Borough Council said it was forced to vote through the changes to meet European working time laws. Residents of Oakleigh House say they felt safer when they knew a warden lived on site.

For more on this story, see the Kentish Express newspaper, out now