A pensioner who was gunned down in his local pub was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, police said last night.

Fred Fowler, 72, was enjoying a drink in the Tap and Barrel pub in Salem Street, Hendon, Sunderland, when three men screeched up in a car and fired a shot through the window at point blank range.

Two of the men then burst into the pub and opened fire again, hitting a 19-year-old man as regulars dived for cover.

Last night, the teenager was in a critical condition but comfortable in hospital.

Detective Superintendent Barbara Franklin, who is leading the hunt for the gunmen, said a number of children were playing in the street outside the pub when the three men arrived in a dark Ford Focus.

The children saw one man run out of the car and fire a shot through a window into the pub, before he ran into the bar with an accomplice.

A number of shots were then fired inside the premises, where there were about a dozen drinkers.

Ballistics experts have yet to say whether the first blast from outside the pub was the fatal shot.

But the detective said she was certain Mr Fowler was an innocent bystander.

Det Supt Franklin said: ''There is nothing in my mind which suggests he was the target. Mr Fowler was an innocent victim in the middle of all this.''

She said she was keeping an open mind about the gunmen's motive.

Mr Fowler was single and lived in sheltered accommodation behind the pub.

Det Supt Franklin said: ''It is absolutely dreadful the impact this has had on people in the pub.

''It was not easy to get information from them because of the trauma they suffered.

"A post-mortem examination has revealed Mr Fowler died of a single gunshot wound.

"We have ballistics experts going to the scene today to find out the sequence of events in which he met his death."

Police have recovered a car they believe is the getaway car in nearby Toward Road.

Chief Superintendent Jim Campbell moved to reassure local residents. In January, only a few hundred yards away from the pub, teenager Scott Pritchard was battered to death on his doorstep.

Two years ago, restaurant manager Peiman Bahmani was stabbed to death in the same area.

But Mr Campbell said violent crime was ''very rare'' in Hendon and he urged people to come forward with information.