A FAMILY say they no longer feel safe in their own home after vandals threw bricks through a window in the early hours of the morning.

The incident occurred as the occupants of the house, in Chestnut Drive, Westhoughton, slept upstairs.

Phil Field was woken by his wife Deborah at around 5.30am when she heard a noise downstairs.

When he checked, he saw two bricks on the wooden living room floor.

They had been thrown through the side glass on the bay window.

Mr Field, aged 41, said: “They must have been standing quite close to get it straight through and not damage the frame.”

When he went outside to look for the culprits, Mr Field saw that a car wing mirror had been smashed a few doors away.

Since the incident, more people have reported damage on the same evening last week in the Washacre Estate, including more car wing mirrors damaged and tyres slashed.

Mr Field, who has three children, aged 13, 18 and 19, said: “I’m a big guy and it is not something that bothers me, but it is does bother my wife and the kids. They were saying they didn’t want to leave the house for a couple of days. It is the mental effect on them really, they were saying ‘why has someone done this to us?’”

Mr Field, who works in a call centre, said: “It looks like there are one or two idiots causing as much damage as they can. We have lived in this house for 11 years and had no trouble before.”

A police spokesman confirmed they were called to a report of a brick being thrown through a window. Anyone with information is asked to call call 101 and quote incident 325 of October 27.