jellied-eel-stall
Target. A vulnerable stall pictured yesterday

From our crime and stewed eels correspondent, Danny SoZ

Following a series of sexual assaults on the stalls of seafood vendors across East London, a 54-year-old man has been arrested in Whitechapel and is being held in custody at the local police station.

During the past 6 months, over a dozen vendors of fresh seafood have reported sex attacks on their stalls, many of which took place while they were open for business.

One owner, Toby Dell, 57, told The Whitechapel Whelk: “I was parked up in Whitechapel Road just outside The Blind Beggar last Tuesday. It was around 11.30 and I was waiting for the punters to come out of the pub and start ordering their jellied eels and whelks.

“All of a sudden, I felt the stall rocking from side to side so I went out the back to investigate. To my amazement, I saw this geezer with his trousers around his ankles going at it full pelt against the side of the stall.

“I shouted at him and asked him what his game was. I was pretty angry and was going to give him a clumping to be honest.

“He must have seen I meant business because he yanked his trousers up and ran off down the road a bit lively. I didn’t run after him because I was serving a customer with a pint of cockles at the time.

“I’m just glad the coppers have nicked the boy. I mean to say, the last thing you want when you’re trying to make a living is to have some mug trying to give your stall the good news when you’re serving customers”

A Whitechapel police spokesman told us last night that they have arrested a 54-year-old local man on suspicion of lewd conduct after a woman reported seeing a man having sex with the exhaust pipe of a mobile eels and mash van in nearby Shoreditch.