Fire, Fight and Police: Chaos Outside Jaynes Baby Bank

On 26 June 2026, emergency services attended an incident outside Jayne’s Baby Bank in Pontypool, after reports of a fire in the alleyway behind the premises and a fight that followed. Within hours it was being discussed across social media, with witnesses, photographs and statements appearing the same afternoon. The two women at the centre of it published very different accounts. This report puts the material in date order and keeps what is established apart from what each side says.

What is not disputed

On the material reviewed, these points are not in dispute:

• A fire started in the alleyway between Peacocks and the nearby chip shop.
• Members of the public tried to put it out before the emergency services arrived.
• A fight took place between Carrie-Anne Ridsdale and Abby Franklyn.
• Police and the fire service attended.
• Carrie-Anne Ridsdale had visible injuries to her face.
• Photographs of the aftermath were published online shortly afterwards.

The fire

Witnesses reported smoke coming from the alleyway behind the premises in the early afternoon. Abby Franklyn later said she was shopping with her grandmother when they noticed it. By her account, she and a member of staff from Peacocks put the fire out with bottles of water, worried that it could spread to the buildings beside it.

Carrie-Anne Ridsdale says Abby started it. Her page’s first post about the fire went up at 14:43:

More lies.

Abby Franklyn set fire to a trolley at the side of peacocks we watched her do it putting them in danger ran in our shop trying to blame us – we were on cctv inside the shop at the time and then she attacked me when we went into the alley to ask her why she started a fire and video her . Police have taken a statement and photos of my injuries. Plus it was on cctv and on Dan phone as he videoed it. Her grandmother and mother were there’s and peacocks staff trying to put the fire out and her own family gave us her details .

Her page, 26 June 2026, 14:43 (archive)

Just over two hours later she added: “You started the fire its on our cctv its on the council cctv that no one else was down the alley at the time.” And, on who put it out: “You didn’t put the fire out the lady from peacocks did.” (archive)

No official finding on how the fire started has been published.

The confrontation

Abby Franklyn’s public account is that Carrie-Anne Ridsdale began shouting at her elderly grandmother, that she stepped between them, and that Carrie-Anne Ridsdale slapped her across the face. Replying to a comment in the Jayne’s Baby Bank Exposed group on the day, she wrote:

She slapped me so I right hooked her a Bugga knocked her out they arrested me cuffed me then seen the cctv an multiple witnesses released me there an then an actually said sorry to me .

Abby Franklyn, Jayne’s Baby Bank Exposed group, 26 June 2026

Carrie-Anne Ridsdale disputes this. In her posts she says Abby started the fire, ran into the shop accusing her of it, and then attacked her. Both accept that there was a fight; each says the other started it. Her full account, in her own words, is set out below.

The police

Several police officers attended alongside the fire service. Abby Franklyn says she was handcuffed, then released once officers had seen the footage and spoken to witnesses. Later she posted again in the group:

I’ve also just found out that after I was put in the roit van officers shouted up “we have arrested the wrong one and said they saw the vidoes where I was in self defence an released me making it known I was not being charged . so I’m not sure weather she was arrested an then taken to the hospital ??? I have no idea ?

Abby Franklyn, Jayne’s Baby Bank Exposed group, after the incident

Carrie-Anne Ridsdale’s own posts confirm that police took statements: “Police have taken a statement and photos of my injuries.” At 23:43 that night her page posted: “Guys really sorry the police have taken me to the hospital as I’m still bleeding and we have accidently left stuff outside p2 /p3. Looks like I have to have stitches after she attacked me .” (archive). Two days later she wrote: “I was not arrested nor am I on bail.”

Both women’s accounts of the police are their own. No police statement has been published on why Abby was detained and released, or on any later arrest.

Messages from the scene

While it was happening, members of the public sent us messages from the scene. They are reproduced as received, with identifying details removed. They were sent before any of the later Facebook statements were published.

Police everywhere.

One woman has been detained shouting that Carrie hit her first.

Carrie has locked herself inside the shop.

Police remain at the location.

Message 1, received during the incident

Carrie has remained inside the premises.

Police are requesting that she attends the police station voluntarily.

Further enquiries are continuing.

Message 2, received while events were still unfolding

Her mother and grandmother

After the first reports, Abby Franklyn’s mother and grandmother each posted in public, disputing Carrie-Anne Ridsdale’s account. Her mother wrote:

I am Abby’s mum I was there and it is lies

Her grandmother rejected the claim that she had started the fire, and gave her own account of the confrontation:

I am the grandmother she accused of starting the fire whatshe doesn’t tell that she was continually in my face shouting abuse and and threatening me

Also let’s get this straight she hit abby first naturally you would hit back yes abby did hit in self defence she still tried gouding abby I don’t write on Facebook but feel need to tell truth

Both statements match Abby Franklyn’s account: the confrontation began with Carrie-Anne Ridsdale and the grandmother, and Abby hit back only after being hit first. Like the other public statements here, they have not been tested by any official process.

What the group saw

Within hours, members of the Exposed group were putting together what they had seen. Some had watched the fire before the fight; others saw the fight itself; one had it from a family member who saw the blood. A number mentioned Abby’s phone footage, and others CCTV said to be held by private individuals. Each account is one person’s, and is read here alongside the rest of the evidence.

Carrie-Anne Ridsdale’s account

Over the next two days her page published a series of posts disputing the version going round. Her main claims were:

• Abby Franklyn started the fire.
• Her shop’s CCTV, inside and out, proves where she was.
• She was attacked while she was on the ground.
• She had a head injury that needed hospital treatment.
• The police who first attended left her bleeding.

Her longest account went up the next morning:

Yesterday we were in the shop on cctv which records inside and outside all day and night proving our whereabouts. Abby Franklyn who we have previously banned for threatening to petrol bomb us, which we also have on cctv with audio. (We didn’t know who she was at this time /…). She started a fire at the side of peacocks we could see her on our cctv she ran into our shop and shouted that we had started the fire – recording us on her phone.

We went to where the fire was where one of peacocks staff were trying to put it out. She then attacked me and hit me whilst I was on the floor. Her Grandmother and Mother gave us her name and details and stayed with us and her until the police arrived to stop her from leaving. The police that turned up left me bleeding with a head injury on the floor knowing I was a vulnerable adult. Dan had to stop her continually hitting me which is on our cctv and he was recording because I told him to record the fire ect.

… Then the police officer took our statements and evidence. At the end of the statement my head was still bleeding and the cpo took me to A& E .

The photo on line is what Abby took of me while I was bleeding with a head injury knowing I was a vulnerable adult because people around told her.

Her page, 27 June 2026, 09:30 (archive). The first cut is a claim about another member of the public, which we do not repeat; the second is for length.

Her page over those three days, in order (UK times):

The petrol bomb claim

The claim that Abby Franklyn had once threatened to “petrol bomb” the shop first appears at 09:30 on 27 June, the morning after the fight. We searched every post in our archive of her pages, back to 2013, and the transcripts of her videos. Before 27 June 2026 the word “petrol” appears only in posts about petrol expenses, car boot pitches and a petrol station address, and Abby Franklyn is never named. The nearest thing is a general remark on TikTok on 13 May 2026: “we’ve had threatening posts. You know? Threatening arson.” (transcript). It names no one, and says nothing of a petrol bomb, a ban or CCTV.

After 27 June the claim became a regular one. On 6 July, on video, showing items left outside: “This is the one that said she was going to do a petrol bomb. And then she started a fire over there.” (transcript). On 26 July: “I’m literally sleeping next to a fire extinguisher especially after that idiot abi threatened a petrol bomb.” (archive)

In another video the same day, 6 July, she tied the claim to the fire service’s ban on the public entering her shop:

But they can’t come in here because of the prohibition. Because, yes, we filled it very full. But also because our girl made that petrol bomb claim. So they can’t come in here because that’s part of the reason why the prohibition is in place. Because there was a credible threat. And then she set fire to something over there the other week.

Her video, 6 July 2026 (transcript)

The fire service’s Prohibition Notice on 5 Crane Street was served on 3 March 2026, after officers had spent more than a year asking for fire safety improvements. The fire service’s own papers are set out in our report on the 72 pages of FOI disclosures. A week before the fight, she had cited the prohibition at the Commercial Street door to try to keep SSE out (Lights Out on Commercial Street).

How her account changed

Set side by side, in her own words:

The photographs

A photograph taken by a member of the public at about midday appears to show Carrie-Anne Ridsdale outside the premises before the incident.

Photographs taken shortly after the fight show her with visible injuries to her face.

Later that evening, a private citizen released a CCTV still which appears to show Carrie-Anne Ridsdale carrying items shortly before midnight.

These images help fix parts of the day’s chronology. On their own they do not show who started the fire or who struck first.

What happened next

• 6 July 2026: two videos repeat the petrol bomb claim, one linking it to the prohibition (above).
• 18 July 2026: on video, she puts the prohibition down to stock: “And yes, we had too much stock and we had a smack on the wrist off the fire.” (transcript)
• 26 July 2026: “that idiot abi threatened a petrol bomb” (archive).
• 3 August 2026: her page says the police have closed a complaint Abby made about being named: “Police just shut down her complaint against me naming her of fb .” (archive). This is her account; we have not seen the police’s.

Where it stands

A fire started, members of the public put it out, a fight followed and the emergency services attended. What is disputed is how those things happened. Abby Franklyn says she put the fire out, was hit first and acted in self-defence, and her mother and grandmother back her. Carrie-Anne Ridsdale says Abby started the fire and attacked her, and that her CCTV proves it.

No police statement has been published, and we know of no charge against either woman. Neither Abby’s phone footage nor the CCTV Carrie-Anne Ridsdale says she holds has been released in full. The dossier records the incident in its timeline.

Sources