A HEARTBROKEN great-grandmother has spoken of her devastation after being tricked by callous thieves.

88-year-old Mrs Audrey Fair was left sobbing when she discovered they had ransacked her house and stolen items of great sentimental value, including the engagement ring and eternity ring her late husband had given her.

“I’ve been put on tablets because it’s left me in such a state and every time I talk about it I start crying,” said Mrs Fair, of St Ann’s Road, Over Hulton

The theft happened at lunchtime last Tuesday when a man, purporting to be from the gas board, called at her terraced house.

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“He had a hi-vis jacket on,” said Mrs Fair. “I asked for some identification and he showed me a lanyard, but because my eyesight is failing I couldn’t really read it.”

The man explained he had come to check the gas and so Mrs Fair allowed him to enter.

She said: “I didn’t lock the front door after I’d let him in because I thought he’d only be there a few minutes, and you don’t normally lock people in your house do you?

“I invited him to sit down, and I think I may even have offered him a cup of tea. He was so polite.”

Being such a decent and trusting person, Mrs Fair thought the black glove he was wearing on his right hand was because he had injured it in some way.

She said the man inspected the room’s heating appliances and asked if he could check the kitchen too.

“He also asked if he could have a look in the back yard to see if the gas supply came in from there – which I thought was a bit odd – but I went with him.

“When he told me that any paving stones damaged in the work would be replaced, I was impressed.

“Before leaving, he also explained that a lady colleague would be coming to visit a bit later to talk to me in more detail.”

“He must only have been there for about 10 minutes.”

However, when Mrs Fair went upstairs a short time later, she discovered that all three bedrooms had been ransacked. Boxes and other items had been tipped all over the floor, drawers had been ripped out and a mattress had even been dragged off one of the beds.

She believes the man had accomplices who burgled the house while she was with the first man in the back yard.

“When I discovered that they’d taken the rings Charles had given me I made a sound that was a cross between a scream and a cry,” Mrs Fair said.

She immediately phoned her daughter but was so traumatised, she was unable to speak at first.

One of Mrs Fair’s five grandchildren, Becky Rowlands, said: “I can’t even begin to describe the rage I feel when I think of what they did to my grandma. I feel physically sick. It was upsetting to see her like that.

“She’s grateful though, because it could have gone a different way. She’s a tough cookie, but she’s lived in that house since she was four years old so for someone to come in and take things like the jewellery box that my grandad bought her for her 19th birthday, is just gross.”

Among the stolen items were a golden masonic charm which opens up like pyramids, an engagement ring with a platinum band and a single stone in the centre with small diamonds around it, a five stone eternity ring, a diamond pendant necklace and a ruby and diamond ring.

Mrs Fair said: “I’m not the sort of person who’s easily duped. My dad was a policeman so he used to drill to to us the importance of being careful.

She added: “It’s been horrible, but I hope when other people hear of what happened to me, it will make them be extra-vigilant.I’d hate what’s happened to me to happen to someone else.”

Luckily, Mrs Fair has a large, loving family and a network of caring friends to help her recover from her ordeal.

“I’ve already had eight vases worth of flowers given to me,” she said.

A neighbour’s CCTV footage captured images of the “gas man” and two associates.

Anybody with information should contact police on 101 or contact the independent charity Crimestoppers, anonymously, on 0800 555 111.