A SUSPECTED shoplifter arrested after she reportedly deliberately coughed in the face of supermarket staff in Stratford and said she had coronavirus has been charged.
Police were called around 7.30pm on Monday to a report of a woman suspected of shoplifting in two supermarkets on Birmingham Road.
At one store it was reported she deliberately coughed in the faces of staff, and at the second threatened to cough at staff while claiming she had coronavirus.
She was taken into police custody, and while attending a medical appointment with officers, was further arrested on suspicion of assaulting an emergency worker and causing intentional racially motivated harassment, alarm and distress.
Donna Hurford, aged 34 of Masons Road, Stratford, has been charged with two counts of theft from shop, two counts of common assault, assault by beating, assault on emergency worker and racially aggravated public order.
