FEISTY 77-year-old Rita Wakeman, who single-handedly took on three burglars, attempting to lock them in her tiny kitchen, has vowed to take revenge if she ever gets her hands on the culprits.

Rita, who lives alone with her cat in Rampart Road, Salisbury, and walks with the aid of a stick, was disturbed by a shadow moving on her wall as she watched television by lamplight on Thursday night.

She got up to investigate and found herself face to face with a youth dressed from head to toe in black.

Rather than panicking, she coolly stepped past the burglar and locked the kitchen door, trapping them both inside together.

Even when the intruder brushed her aside and opened the door to admit two accomplices, she refused to back down.

She said: "I shoved the bolt across the door but he pushed me out of the way and opened the door again.

"Then two other chaps burst in and started ransacking the place - they tipped my chair over, looked under my mattress and opened drawers and threw everything all over the floor."

Even though she was outnumbered, brave Rita's first instinct was to keep trying to fight back.

She said: "One of them went into the cupboard under the stairs. There is nothing in there but clothes and I told him that but he started pulling things out anyway.

"So I got hold of him by the scruff of the neck and told all of them to get out of my house straight away."

But she was forced to stand by helplessly and watch as the three men continued their frantic search until they found a wallet containing her pension money and housekeeping of £95.

Only then did they make their escape, leaving a shaken Rita to call the police.

But just days after her ordeal she has said that she would not hesitate to stick up for herself all over again.