Cambridge police and businesses have issued warnings after the ‘clowning’ craze, where pranksters dress up as creepy clowns and terrorise the public, finally spread to the city.

A man in Peterborough claims he punched a clown in the face after they jumped out at him on Monday night – the first clown incident Cambridgeshire police have had to tackle since the recent wave began.

Over the past week incidents of ‘scary-clowns’ have been reported all over the country, some stories involving children being followed. Clowns have been armed with knives, a hammer, and a baseball bat.

On Sunday, police in Cambridge cracked down on a group following online reports saying that they planned to dress as clowns and act anti-socially. They set up a dispersal order preventing people from gathering in Hinchingbrooke Park, an area of Huntingdon (North-West of Cambridge), but no one turned up in costume.

These ‘scary-clown’ incidents have been seen before in the Cambridge area. In 2013, six cases were reported to the Cambridgeshire police and in 2014 Cambridgeshire police increased patrols to track down a man dressed as a clown who was sighted roaming the streets of Sawtry and knocking on residents’ doors.

Both then and now police warned that causing distress to another person in this way could lead to prosecution under the Public Order Act: last Sunday in Norwich, a 30-year-old man dressed as a clown was arrested for jumping out at a woman, screaming at her and chasing after her.

Inspector Paul Rogerson of Cambridgeshire police said: "With Hallowe'en around the corner I'd like to take this opportunity to remind people that deliberately causing distress to another person could result in a criminal prosecution.

"In the coming weeks we do not want to spoil the fun of genuine trick or treaters. However, anti-social behaviour and intentionally causing distress to others will not be tolerated."

Michael Bates, a clown from Huntingdon, hopes that Cambridge students will not latch on to the trend: “I think the police should be tough on anyone dressing up as a clown to scare people on the roads.

“This could cause a terrible accident. I think what these people are doing is disgusting. We don't want students in Cambridge dressing up as clowns and scaring people for their parties but I'm not going to tell them not to do it because of course then they will.”

Bates also noted concern that such people were giving clowns a bad name, saying: "My clown character is not scary.”

Tracy Parkings, the manager of Partymania, the Cambridge fancy dress shop on Burleigh Street, told Cambridge News: “We haven't seen an increase in sales but of course we would be happy if it happened. I don't really know why people are particularly bothered about clowns when people dress up as zombies. But people do get scared so if you are going to dress up as one then clown responsibly."