Menacing clown ‘stalking’ village dares police to catch them

Clown dressed in Pennywise-style outfit reportedly leaving locals ‘terrified’

The clown, dressed in a Pennywise-style outfit complete with a mask and make-up, has reportedly been terrifying locals in Skelmorlie - a village of around 2,000 people in North Ayrshire (Cole Deimos/Facebook)

A menacing clown said to be stalking the streets of a sleepy village in Scotland weeks before Halloween is daring police to catch them.

The clown, dressed in a Pennywise-style outfit complete with a mask and make-up, has reportedly been terrifying locals in Skelmorlie - a village of around 2,000 people in North Ayrshire.

A Facebook account has been set up for the clown under the name Cole Deimos, with a video uploaded to the page daring police to hunt them down.

Referring to reports that police had been aware of their activities, the clown says: “Do you think I care? They’d have to catch me first anyway.

A Facebook account has been set up for the clown under the name Cole Deimos (Cole Deimos/Facebook)

“And yes, that’s a dare”.

The Facebook page says the clown went to “Hellgate High School” before going to “Clown School”. They live in Skelmorlie, about 30 miles west of Glasgow.

Other pictures and videos of the clown posing around darkened streets have also been uploaded and then deleted from social media, as reported by Sky News.

In one image, the clown, said to have first appeared in the village in 2021, stared at the screen with a wide grin on their face, while holding a red balloon.

Pennywise the Dancing Clown is the main character in Stephen King’s 1986 novel IT, which was made into a 1990 mini-series with Tim Curry as the scary clown.

The book, made into a two-part film in 2017, in which Pennywise stalks the streets of Derry, Maine, killing children.

In the book and films, Pennywise tempts children to their death by making red balloons bob along the road and down storm drains, where he lies in wait to grab them and pull them into the sewers.

One local, who asked not to be named, told the Daily Record he wasn’t letting his two boys - aged 11 and 13 - out at night after sightings of the clown.

“Whoever this is they are scaring everybody - he needs to be stopped,” the person said.

“Someone needs to have a word with him before the police get involved or he really terrifies someone. He could give someone a heart attack.”

Police Scotland has been contacted for comment.