A NUN collapsed suffering chest pains after trying to stand up to a truncheon-wielding robber.

Sister Kerry Blair was confronted by Daniel Johnston as she walked alone at night along Drummond Road, Crosby.

Johnston, 22, his face partly covered by his jacket, brandished the stolen police truncheon and demanded her bag, pulling at the straps. Even though she mistakenly thought he was brandishing a knife, she bravely refused to let go.

Sister Blair, 51, collapsed and suffered an angina attack as Johnston ran off empty-handed.

Yesterday, Johnston was jailed for three years and nine months and called “dangerous” by the judge.

David Evans, prosecuting, told Liverpool Crown Court that, just ten minutes prior to the incident, at 7.20pm on April 8, Johnston had also tried to rob a 50-year-old woman as she walked in Netherton.

He had again brandished the truncheon and demanded her bag but when she repeatedly screamed he ran off. He was arrested shortly afterwards after two young girls, who had witnessed the second attack, pointed him out to police.

Jailing Johnston, of no fixed address, Judge Gerald Clifton said that he had picked on two vulnerable women and had continued with the second offence, despite his victim telling him she was a nun.

He described him as "dangerous" and said that when Johnston was fuelled by drink, and sometimes also drugs, he was liable to commit crimes he would not dream of when sober.