Mr. Fred Thomas to deal with.

Outraged over the most recent attack on an employee of his son's company Four Star Pizza, the former middleweight boxing champion and security firm owner has taken matters into his own hands. He is offering a $260 reward for information that leads him to the three youths who beat a delivery man off his motorcycle in Pembroke on Wednesday night and grabbed $59 cash and two pizzas from him.

"Whether I'll kick in their doors and take a baseball bat to them, or turn them over to the Police -- I haven't decided,'' Mr. Thomas said. "I hope I don't do to them what they did to my son's driver.'' The 42-year-old man was beaten with a blunt instrument and taken to hospital with head and neck wounds after driving into the trap, at Overview Lane on Mount Hill.

After taking the $260 cash out of the bank yesterday morning, Mr. Thomas headed straight to the site of the attack to ask questions.

He said he decided to offer a reward because he did not feel Police were doing enough to catch the culprits.

"Money always seems to talk,'' he said, adding he had already received two tips from people who had heard about the reward.

Mr. Thomas was planning to meet with the two people last night. "I expect to confront the culprits before the week is out,'' he said.

Four Star Pizza owner Mr. Maurico Thomas was full of support for his father's efforts, saying they would not only help track down the culprits, but also act as a deterrent.

"There is sometimes certain information people won't tell Police,'' the former policeman said.

Mr. Thomas junior said he feared that if the attacks continued, his company would have to boycott certain areas of the Island.

"We don't want to end up with a whole pile of areas that we don't deliver to because of some foolish kids,'' he said. "It would not be fair to our customers.'' A number of pizzas had been delivered to the Mount Hill address that the ill-fated delivery man attended -- and there had never been any problems before, he said.

He added his employees were trained to detect suspect calls. And a pizza would not be delivered if the caller did not give a full name and address.

"I think people are just getting very brazen -- times are hard,'' he said.

Mr. Thomas said there had been about four attacks on his pizza deliverers since he opened two years ago.

There have been several other attacks reported on pizza deliverers from competing companies.

Mr. Thomas senior said it may be time for the cat o' nine tails to be brought back.

"There are too many bleeding hearts and soft judges out there, '' he said.

"And the talk around the back of town is that these young punks can't wait until the new prison opens so they can go up there.

"I think the time has come for the cat o' nine tails. A good flogging on their backsides will deter them more than prison will.'' Mr. Fred Thomas.