A blind and disabled man has been assaulted and robbed in his own home.
The victim, who uses crutches and a wheelchair, suffered a cut to his face and was knocked to the ground during the "despicable and opportunistic" theft.
The 39-year-old was in his Edinburgh home shortly before 1pm yesterday when there was a knock on his door.
When he opened it, a man forced his way into the Broughton Road property, wielded a sharp object and robbed the man of various possessions.
The victim suffered the facial cut and was knocked to the ground during a struggle before the intruder fled from the property.
Officers at Lothian and Borders Police are looking to speak to anyone who can help them catch the suspect.
He is said to be about 5ft 10ins and slim. He had a local accent and is thought to be in his mid twenties or early thirties.
The intruder also had a strong smell of stale body odour, smoke and alcohol.
Detective Sergeant Dave Pinkney said: "This was a despicable and opportunistic theft which targeted a vulnerable man who was virtually unable to defend himself.
"Despite his visual impairment, the victim has provided us with a fairly detailed description of the suspect and we are carrying out enquiries within the local community to identify him.
"Anyone who was in the Broughton Road area on Wednesday afternoon and remembers seeing anything suspicious, or who can help us trace the man responsible for this crime, is asked to contact police immediately."
Anyone with information can police on 0131 311 3131.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article