A TEENAGER involved in post office robbery only days before assaulting a jeweller with a truncheon won a reduction in his jail term yesterday - because of his age.

Thomas Michael Reay, 22, was jailed for 12 years at Newcastle Crown Court last June after admitting attempted robbery and being found guilty of robbery.

London Criminal Appeal Court concluded his sentence was "somewhat excessive" for a youth who was 19 at the time - and cut his term to nine years.

But Judge Richard Brown, sitting with Lord Justice Judge and Mr Justice Andrew Smith, retained the extended five-year sentence also imposed on Reay, of Joan Street, Benwell, Newcastle It means if he reoffends within the five years after his release, he can be recalled to jail.

On January 2, 2001, post mistress Enid Turner was working in a sub-post office at Hamsterley Colliery, near Consett, County Durham, which is attached to her home.

Customers were in the shop when Reay and a co-accused entered. Both were wearing masks and wielding knives.

An alarm was activated and Reay jumped on the counter waving his knife.

Mrs Turner's husband, Eric, a former leader of Derwentside District Council, came in and used a 4ft pole to chase Reay away from the counter. The robbers fled with £1,900.

Two days later, jewellery shop manager Richard Elliot was at his store, in Collingwood Street, Newcastle, when Reay, masked and armed with a truncheon came in, followed by two accomplices. Mr Elliot was hit with the truncheon with considerable force, leaving him with a wound to his head. He struggled with Reay and managed to wrestle the weapon from him.