Anyone with information is asked to call 101 and ask for Log Number 630 for 25/1/13. That’s how Devon and Cornwall police have recorded the death of a would-be armed robber who was overpowered by punters in a betting shop – one of those betting shops where the listlessness is so thick and suffocating you could use it as loft insulation. At around 6.45pm Friday, a 50-something bloke strode into the Ladbroke’s on Crownhill Road, Plymouth (pebble-dashed, next to the fish’n’chip shop with the scaffolding), brandishing a ‘pistol-like weapon’ (subsequent police description) and wearing a gas mask. Must have been the gas mask: his face hidden but the punters could see immediately this was moreDad’s Army than Grand Theft Auto. They didn’t panic but sounds like he did when maybe a dozen of them piled in: can’t breathe; passing out; never to regain consciousness. But was he conscious that he couldn’t pull it off even with a ‘pistol-like weapon’ in his hand? Is that what kept you down on the pale blue vinyl flooring, Lazarus? That no one pays attention to you; still wouldn’t, even if you got up and walked.