Policeman's daughter Lauren Webb has been hailed the youngest crime fighter in Sussex after helping catch a thief.
The four-year-old was in a shopping mall when she spotted the villain pinching her mother's purse.
She tugged at her mother's coat to alert her and then pointed out the culprit as he stood nearby.
Mother Nikki, 30, set off in hot pursuit and, with the help of two off-duty police officers, a man was arrested and later charged.
Lauren's father, Crawley-based PC Matt Webb, 29, said: "Lauren knows what I do for a living and is interested in my work.
"She kept her eyes open and did everything right."
PC Webb, a Sussex officer for 11 years, made a bravery certificate for Lauren as a keepsake.
Lauren, her mother and her one-year-old brother Freddie were in the County Mall shopping centre when the thief took the purse from a bag hanging from Freddie's pushchair.
A Sussex Police spokesman said: "If every child was as observant and quick thinking as Lauren we could wipe out crime."
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