A SHOP manager has blasted police for failing to catch a group suspected of stealing from his store – despite giving officers a running commentary as he chased them on the M40.

Rishi Madhani said police had “got their priorities all wrong” after he chased a minibus of suspected Liverpool football fans 48 miles through four counties.

The 29-year-old said he gave the minibus’s exact location, registration and even the firm it was hired from by mobile phone.

But he ran out of petrol at junction 12 in Warwickshire – and no arrests have been made.

Now Mr Madhani says he could close if police do not improve responses.

Police today said they were aware of the calls and efforts were made to find the suspects but declined to comment further.

The incident happened on Saturday when Mr Madhani said about 12 drunken males brazenly walked out of C.J Stores with armfuls of alcohol worth £200 at about 10.30pm.

He gave pursuit with a member of staff as a passenger.

In a furious letter to Thames Valley Police chief constable Sara Thornton he said: “Throughout all this time my staff member was on the phone to the police giving them the exact direction and location of the vehicle and at what speed it was travelling.

“The group soon became aware I was following them and proceeded to throw projectiles (the beer cans and bottles they had stolen) at my vehicle.”

He wrote: “I was extremely disappointed to find out even though I had travelled through four counties [and] at that time of night not one single police vehicle was able to respond.”

And he said he was “shocked” to find the police took an hour to send an officer, a special constable, to the store to take a statement.

Clear CCTV footage had been handed to officers, he said, and he had written to Liverpool Football Club to ask them to take action. The club had played West Ham that day.

Mr Madhani told the Bucks Free Press: “I am very disappointed. I always help them when they ask for CCTV for incidents outside the store – when I needed help they weren’t there.”

He said many villagers felt police did not respond quickly enough.

His letter warns: “If this situation occurs regularly and with the lack of police presence and response then I will be forced to close down which will have a detrimental effect on the village.”

Force spokesman Marianne Shaw said: “We were aware of the vehicle that they were talking about and we were looking for that vehicle.

“I don’t think I can be drawn any further.”

She said an officer telephoned Mr Madhani three minutes after he first contacted police at the store.

An officer was not immediately dispatched to the store as it was established the suspects had left, she said. It was a better use of resources to search for them, she said.

In July, Councillor Martin Tett, a cabinet member on Buckinghamshire County Council, blasted Chf Const Thornton over police responses to calls (see link, bottom of story).

He told her at a council meeting: “They don’t come, they don’t turn up, it is not something they are interested in.”