Police are calling on the public to help them find a Coronation Street actor look-alike who posed as a water engineer and stole �1,400 from a elderly woman.
The 89-year-old opened the front door of her home in Brading Crescent, Wanstead, to a man claiming he was checking for water leaking from the flat above.
He told her he wanted to check her bathroom and he went upstairs.
When he left, the pensioner checked the area she kept her money in and found it had all been taken.
The man police are looking for is described as white, with a similar look to the character Tyrone on ITV1 soap Coronation Street.
He was aged between 28 and 35, and wearing a zip up top, dark trousers and blue latex gloves.
A police spokesman said: “It appears that the suspect had also knocked at another address nearby and asked the residents if they were having painting work done or if they needed a quote. But they declined the offer and he went away.”
Police are urging residents to ask callers for ID if they are at all suspicious.
Anyone with information about the incident, which happened on May 20 at about 2.35pm, should call Det Con Alison Shepherd on 020 8345 2610.
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