Falmouth police have urged anybody who is a victim of hate crime to report it immediately following the racial abuse of a local shop owner.

Over the weekend, Haidi Ocampo, 49 , who is originally from the Philippines closed up The Corner Shop on Berkeley Vale after she suffered "awful racist abuse" leaving her too upset to continue when a man buying tobacco was said to have insulted her.

Sergeant Paul Kelly, from the Falmouth local policing team, told the Packet: “We take reports of hate crime very seriously. We will be liaising with the victim in this case to offer reassurance and ensure that any offences have been appropriately recorded.

“The evidence will be reviewed and enquiries are ongoing.

“We actively encourage anyone who is victim of a hate crime to report this to the police. This can be done by email at 101@dc.police.uk, by calling 101 or 999 in an emergency.

“Alternatively, this can be done online via the following links: Hate crime/incident reporting|Devon and Cornwall Police devon-cornwall.police.uk and Stop Homophobic, Transphobic, Racial, Religious & Disability Hate Crime - True Vision report-it.org.uk"

Haidi has suffered a spate of racist abuse over the past few months and says the trauma from it all means that she is always worried somebody is going to come in and treat her in the way the man treated her.

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She rang 101 following the incident on Saturday but was told because there was no harm to her the police did not need to come.

Five months ago the Packet reported on a series of similar incidents of racist abuse involving Haidi over the Christmas period. Full drinks bottles were thrown at her shop window while she and customers were inside, and children banged their fists on her windows as well as saying racist slurs.