A TEENAGE robber who held up a dales village cycle shop at pistol point was warned yesterday that he faces several years behind bars.

Stuart Smith, 19, will be sentenced in a few weeks following his conviction, "on the clearest evidence", by a jury at Durham Crown Court.

Smith, of Marlborough, Seaham, County Durham, denied robbing Weardale Mountain Bikes' owner Ian Stuart Perrin, and using a firearm with intent to avoid lawful arrest.

But he was found guilty of both charges on a unanimous verdict after a four-day trial.

The court heard that Smith, wearing a ski-mask and carrying what proved to be an imitation pistol, burst into Mr Perrin's shop in Front Street, Frosterley, shortly before 2pm on October 21 last year.

He demanded a bike and rode off on a £595 trials cycle, but with customer Michael Leatherland in pursuit in his car.

Despite being warned off by Smith - who pointed the pistol at him and fired it in the air - Mr Leatherland got a good look and later picked him out from an identity parade.

Smith was arrested beside the River Wear, at Windy Nook picnic site in nearby Wolsingham, about 45 minutes after the robbery.

He told the court he was with two older men who travelled from Seaham by car, but he got out because he wanted nothing to do with the robbery.

Following the jury verdict, Judge Denis Orde adjourned sentence pending preparation of reports by the probation service. Smith was remanded in custody.

The judge said: "The jury found you guilty on the clearest evidence, and you know it. I will have to pass a sentence of several years' detention.

"You are under no illusions. You are an intelligent young man, intelligent enough to know that it is a serious matter to engage in armed robbery, holding up a shop keeper like that.

"What aggravates it, you brandished that gun at that citizen, who was acting in a public spirited way, and then sought to blame two others for the crime you committed," said Judge Orde