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Residents became too scared to leave their homes after the rogue rodent went on a five-day rampage. The crazed critter started by attacking people – including pensioners and children – and cats in their gardens last Thursday. Locals were left with nasty cuts to their hands and heads after being bitten by the squirrel’s razorsharp teeth. Nicknamed “Stripe” by locals after the evil character from The Gremlins film, it started launching itself at “frightening speed” as residents took out their bins. It even chased people down the street.

Its reign of terror was finally brought to an end on Monday when it was caught in a humane trap by Corinne Reynolds, 65. She arranged for a local vet to put it down but as she was loading the car the RSPCA turned up out of the blue and took it away.

The RSPCA said yesterday they had reluctantly put it down because it was illegal to release it back into the wild. They said: “We were incredibly sad to have to put this squirrel to sleep but were left with no choice due to changes in legislation in 2019 making it illegal to release grey squirrels back into the wild.

“We do not agree with this law and opposed it but we have to comply. There are numerous ways to humanely deter grey squirrels and we would urge people not to trap them as it is now illegal to release them into the wild and the only option is to put them to sleep.”

Corinne said she had been feeding the squirrel since the summer and it had been making regular trips to her garden in Buckley in Flintshire, NorthWales. Despite befriending her, it also bit her on the hand. The mum of seven, who works as a home carer, said: “He started attacking people who were just taking their recycling to the bin, and they are gruesome injuries.

“He’s not a friendly natured squirrel I am afraid, he is a rogue one and I started to wonder if he had got something going on inside his head like a tumour. “The speed of it was frightening, he dashed from the roof of my garden shed to me – but when he did it to everyone else, he bit them. On one occasion he chased a lad down the road and then his dad was left with a bloody cut on his head.

“He was attacking people for no reason. The front tooth breaks the skin in a quite lethal way. I still have a scar on my finger.” Corinne added: “We know of 21 victims but there must be more because not everybody would have come forward on social media.” After she caught it she was told it would have to be put down. A local vet offered to do it for £110 and Corinne used social media to ask for donations.

She said: “Because it is a grey squirrel, you can’t release it – there are rules for it. Red squirrels are different. By law, once you capture a grey squirrel you have to report it and it has to be put to sleep. After I caught it, I put a post on Facebook and we all chipped in. I wanted to protect other people from being attacked. To be fair, he needed to be put out of his misery.”

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She added: “On Monday night, we had gone over our £110 target. But yesterday morning I was loading the car and had the caged squirrel inside a black bin, just in case it tried to escape. Then out of the blue the RSPCA turned up. They must have got hold of what was happening to people in Buckley.”

One victim was granite technician, Scott Felton, 34, who was attacked on Boxing Day. He said: “I was outside having a cigarette at my back door. This squirrel came out of nowhere and jumped on to my arm and bit me on my hand. It all happened so quick. I had to go to the hospital and have a tetanus jab.”

Another was Sheree Robinson, 42, who said: “This squirrel is not very nice at all, it’s a nutty squirrel. He’s a bit of a psycho – he’s had five or six of my neighbours. He had me when I was collecting my recycling bags. Let’s just say it had me good and proper. It proper latched on and its teeth were like pins.”

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