ST ANDREW, Jamaica — The police yesterday nabbed one of two alleged robbers who were reportedly travelling on a motorcycle while targeting people in the Liguanea area of St Andrew.

The constabulary’s Corporate Communications Unit (CCU) reported that about midday yesterday, two officers from the Matilda’s Corner Police Station witnessed the two men on a motorcycle snatching a woman’s handbag on Old Hope Road in St Andrew near the intersection with Mountain View Avenue.

The officers pursued the robbers and caught up with them on Bundy Lane in the parish, where they signalled the driver to stop, said CCU, adding that the pillion rider pulled a firearm and opened gunfire at the police.

The police said the attack was repelled and the men fled into the Swallowfield area.

According to CCU, an alert was then issued by Police Emergency Communication Centre, and the Matilda’s Corner Quick Response Team joined in the effort to apprehend the armed robbers.

The police said the Quick Response Team intercepted the men along North Avenue in Swallowfield and the alleged robbers fired at the police again but officers managed to disable the motorcycle. Both men ran in different directions.

However, one of the men — the pillion rider — was cornered by a team from the Counter-Terrorism and Organised Crime Investigations Branch, who had been guided to the area by the PECC team. The police said he had been hiding at a premises on Swallowfield Road in the parish. A Beretta 9mm pistol with a magazine containing eleven rounds of ammunition was taken from him.

The driver of the motorcycle escaped, however, a black knapsack that he was carrying was retrieved. The police said it contained items that were subsequently identified as belonging to a woman who was robbed in the Mona area of the parish earlier the same day.

The police said they have since seized three motorcycles, and are continuing their search for the man who escaped, as well as others they suspect are involved.

A day before this incident, two men were arrested on Lady Musgrave Road in the parish minutes after they held up a woman and robbed her.