The elderly pensioner who stabbed an armed, career criminal to death during a botched robbery of his home is being forced to sell his house and move, allegedly fearing for his life.

Richard Osborn-Brooks, 78, has been living under police protection since he was targeted more than a week ago.

He killed burglar Henry Vincent, 37, after he and an accomplice broke into his house wielding a screwdriver as a weapon in the early hours of the morning on April 4th.

Meanwhile, associates of Mr. Vincent, a career criminal known to target pensioners, have said friends and family within the traveller community will be looking to avenge his killing. Vincent was reportedly a member of the traveller community near Hither Green in south-east London, reports The Guardian, and “tensions between Travellers and nearby communities have come to the fore” in the local area after his death.

And, as the pensioner is forced to leave the area of south London he calls home, police have been protecting flowers placed on his street by the robber’s family, which had been repeatedly removed by angry locals.

The equivalence you draw between the elderly home-owner and the intruder, ie that their respective fates are by implication equally tragic, is extremely worrying. Mounting a shrine on the very property in question is to anyone with a moral compass both wrong and threatening. https://t.co/8UKbBRIZvY — Peter Whittle AM (@prwhittle) April 12, 2018

Now, a friend of Mr. Osborne-Brooks has anonymously told the Mirror that he and his disabled wife will definitely not be returning to their home in Hither Green.

He said: “They are waiting for the dust to settle before they announce that publicly and put their house on the market. It’s the fact that they could come back and that his wife’s disabled. They could terrorise him. It’s not safe.

“He’s got what happened that night on his conscience for the rest of his life now. He’s never going to forget that he’s killed someone.

“He’s not a violent person he’s a really nice run of the mill guy.”

It was also reported this weekend that the family of the slain burglar is planning a £100,000 funeral that will pass by the home of Mr. Osborn-Brooks.

Gun Free UK: 78-Yr-Old Man Arrested After Stabbing Burglar to Death with Screwdriver https://t.co/obVVsy0DQ8 — Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) April 4, 2018

A source told the Sun: “They plan to take the procession right past the house. It’s supposed to be a message to locals and the guy who killed him that gypsies are not to be messed with.

“Vincent’s spent his life ripping off the elderly yet his funeral’s designed to make you think he was some kind of gypsy god.

“They’re planning to spend £50,000 just on flowers. There will be limousines and ornate horse-drawn carriages.”

Police continue to hunt one Billy Jeeves, 28, who is thought to have fled the crime scene after Mr. Vincent was killed.

The Met Police released a mugshot of Mr. Jeeves and said he has links to Orpington and Swanley in Kent, and Cambridge.

Police also want to hear from anybody who may have seen his vehicle, a white Vauxhall Astra van in the days and hours before and after the burglary.

https://twitter.com/metpoliceuk/status/983351153927839744