A thief who was short of money in the run up to Christmas targeted the same shop two days running.

Craig Gilroy, 30, of George Street, North Shore, pleaded guilty to two offences of theft.

He was given a 12 months conditional discharge and ordered to pay £47 compensation with £85 costs plus £20 victims’ surcharge.

Prosecutor, Pam Smith, said Gilroy was detained at the B and M Bargains store, Whitegate Drive, on December 23 at noon, after stealing three jars of coffee valued at £14.

CCTV showed he had been in the shop the day before and taken four bottles of liqueur worth £47.

He had a record of 29 previous offences of theft and similar matters and at the time of the offence was on post prison sentence supervision.

Howard Green, defending, said in the run up to Christmas his client was short of money and decided to steal to get some. Gilroy, who had been diagnosed with bi-polar disorder, was estranged from his family.

He had no permanent accommodation but was allowed to sleep at the address he had given.

He had also missed appointments with the probation service on his post prison sentence supervision.

Blackpool Gazette

A prisoner apologised after making loud banging noises from his cell under Blackpool Magistrates’ Court which could be heard in the courtrooms.

Craig Gilroy, 30, of Chesterfield Road, North Shore, pleaded guilty to two offences of theft.

He was sentenced to a six months community order with up to 15 days rehabilitation to be supervised by the probation service, banned from entering Marks and Spencer, Church Street, for six months and ordered to pay £35 compensation with £85 costs plus £85 victims’ surcharge by District Judge Jane Goodwin sitting at Blackpool Magistrates’ Court.

Prosecutor, Andrew Robinson, said Gilroy took a woman’s jacket worth £35 from Marks and Spencer on September 16 at 10.15am.

He was chased but got away.

At midday security officers spotted him and when he was apprehended Gilroy was found to have five jackets valued at £175 from Marks and Spencer which he had stolen just minutes earlier.

Gilroy at the time of the thefts was on licence from prison.

He had a criminal record of 99 previous offences.

Brett Chappell, defending, said his client had stolen from Marks and Spencer because his benefits had not yet been in place and he had been using Spice.

Blackpool Gazette

Richard Broughan apologised over arguments in pubs

Richard Broughan apologised over arguments in pubs

A councillor has apologised after arguing with residents.

Stoke-on-Trent City Councillor Richard Broughan was found by the authority’s Standards Committee to have got into a drunken argument over payment at a pub.

He had failed twice to write an apology letter and attend extra training, after being asked to do so by the council.

Mr Broughan has now apologised and confirmed he went to training for alcohol issues and will attend code of conduct sessions.

The Standards Committee upheld a complaint from an unnamed Stoke-on-Trent pub, during which the councillor, who represents the For Britain party on the Abbey and Hulton ward, was said to be “intoxicated and swearing” whilst arguing with a man at the bar, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS).

In a second complaint about a different incident – which was partially upheld – it was claimed Mr Broughan threatened to have the Travellers Rest pub in Milton shut down.

In a related incident, the councillor accepted a police caution for assault at a Milton fish and chip shop, but this complaint was not upheld by the committee as he was not on council business at the time.

Mr Broughan was previously ruled to bring the authority into disrepute over claims he made sexual remarks about a woman dressed as an elf.

BBC News

POMPEY football thugs who terrorised Portsmouth city centre ahead of a Plymouth game were shown no mercy by a judge who threw eight hooligans behind bars for a total of nearly 10 years.

The gang of 16 defendants, who appeared at Portsmouth Crown Court throughout the week, were clinging to the hope they may be spared jail for their violent disorder before the League Two clash in April last year.

Stills from body-worn police cameras during violence before the Pompey-Plymouth game in 2017. 'Eight men have now been jailed.

Stills from body-worn police cameras during violence before the Pompey-Plymouth game in 2017. ‘Eight men have now been jailed.

But those hopes were crushed for half of them as one by one they were sent down.

Despite lengthy running battles against police in Guildhall Square and clashes with Plymouth fans, including where one was repeatedly booted like a football, things could have been far worse.

Sentencing the group, Judge Timothy Mousley said: ‘It is a matter of luck there were no serious injuries especially to the man on the floor getting kicked.’

Robbie Fowler, 22, of April Square, Landport, was handed the longest jail term out of the hooligans after he was given two years behind bars and a six year football banning order.

Judge Mousley told Fowler, who was serving a four year banning order at the time, he was the ‘most prominent among the group’ with him seen ‘limbering up’ to fight. Chief among his offences in amongst the constant violent disorder were him kicking out at a police dog and trying to get a policeman to fight him.

Matthew Allinson, 33, of Frogmore Lane, Waterlooville was given 18 months jail and a six year football banning order.

Richard Hampshire, 26, of Tudor Crescent, was given 14 months custody and a six year football banning order.

Ryan Keating, 19, of Oxenwood Green, Havant, was given 13 months in a young offenders institute and a six year football banning order.

Anthony Hopkins, 22, of Langley Road, Buckland, was given 12 months prison and a six year football banning order.

Tommy Russell, 20, of Appleshaw Green, Havant, received 12 months at a young offenders institute and a six year banning order.

Harley Hawkins, 19, of Whitecliffe Avenue, Copnor, was handed the same sentence.

Sean Mitchell, 46, of Chaucer Drive, Chichester, was handed 14 months prison and a six year football banning order.

Simon Hore, 33, of Medina Road, Cosham, was given 13 months prison suspended for 18 months, 250 hours unpaid work, compensation of £250 to Pompey and a four year football banning order.

Louis Glasspool received the same sentence but was given 10 months at a young offenders institute suspended for 18 months.

Harry Jarvie, 21, of Manor Road, Buckland also received the same but was given 12 months jail suspended for 18 months.

Connor Bowen, 19, of Lower Farlington Road, Farlington, was handed eight months in a detention centre suspended for 18 months, was given 250 hours unpaid work, 20 rehabilitation days, told to pay Pompey £250 and given a four year football banning order.

Tommy Houlden, 19, of Hayling Avenue, Copnor, was given the same as Bowen but was given 15 months at a detention centre suspended for 18 months and 15 rehabilitation days.

Asa Palmer, 23, of Sea View Road, Drayton, got nine months jail suspended for 18 months, 250 hours unpaid work, 20 rehabilitation days, told to pay compensation of £250 and a four year football banning order.

Jack Stobart, 23, of April Square, Landport, was given 12 months jail suspended for 18 months, 250 hours unpaid work, a four year football banning order and told to pay Pompey £250.

Shane Bartram, 26, of Goodwood Road, Southsea, got 12 months prison suspended for 18 months, as well as 250 hours unpaid work, told to pay £250 compensation and a four year banning order.
Portsmouth News

A thug hurled foul racial abuse at a takeaway restaurant worker and assaulted his mother’s girlfriend.

Daniel Habberjam had 10 months added to the two-year prison sentence he is currently serving for a violent street attack on a former girlfriend in front of her three-year-old daughter.

Leeds Crown Court heard Habberjam was drunk when he entered a takeaway in Pontefract town centre on June 26 last year and accused a member of staff of being a “nonse”.

Habberjam shouted foul-mouthed racist abuse at the victim and accused him of having sex with an underage girl.

Habberjam also said: “Get out of our country, you do not belong here.”

The 30-year-old smashed a car window outside the premises as he left.

Robert Yates, prosecuting, said Habberjam attacked his partner’s mother days later at her home in Pontefract.

He threw her onto a sofa and grabbed her throat during the incident before being stopped by his partner.

Habberjam, of Cromwell Crescent, Pontefract, pleaded guilty to assault, criminal damage, racially aggravated threatening behaviour and breach of a criminal behaviour order.

The court heard Habberjam has previous convictions for violence.

He was given a two-year sentence earlier this year for punching his former partner in the street and throwing her to the floor. Christopher Morton, mitigating, said Habberjam had admitted the offences at an early stage.

Mr Morton said his client was now single, employed and expected his prison sentence to be increased. Sentencing Habberjam judge Christopher Batty said: “You have got an awful record for violence and abuse and damage.”

Wakefield Express

A CUNNING rogue staged a bogus 21st birthday bash in a staggering bid to cheat the law and escape justice.

Geoffrey Leigh Ewart went to extraordinary lengths to wriggle out of trouble for a Middlesbrough street brawl.

He faked his own 21st birthday party and falsified photographs to prove his arrest was a case of mistaken identity.

He tried to make the camera lie with pictures showing himself wearing a 21st birthday badge and blowing out candles on a 21st birthday cake.

The snaps were really taken 18 months or more after his real 21st birthday celebrations.

His audacious but doomed attempt to pull the wool over the courts’ eyes backfired spectacularly with a long prison sentence yesterday.

A well-timed pub refurb and detective work rumbled Ewart’s elaborate deception.

Teesside Crown Court heard how Ewart, now 24, was caught in a melee near Albert Bridge at about 2.15am on September 26, 2008.

Five police officers identified him from CCTV footage as the man headbutting and kicking another unidentified man for no apparent reason.

When interviewed Ewart said he wasn’t there and “it didn’t even look like me”.

He produced the photographs which he claimed would prove his innocence – some supposedly taken around his 21st birthday in May 2007, months before the street fight.

They showed him with a tattoo on his right arm – unlike the man in the CCTV film.

CPS prosecutor Alexander Menary said: “It is meant to say, ‘This couldn’t have been me because my tattoo would have been shown, because here I am on these photographs with it on May 2007’.”

The scam was undone with police inquiries at the Norman Conquest pub in Normanby, where the “birthday” pictures were taken.

The pub owner said the photos must have been taken after refurbishments, which took place after Ewart’s fight.

Other photographs were doctored with dates superimposed on to them.

Ewart, of Grisedale Crescent, Grangetown, admitted affray and attempting to pervert the course of justice.

He also admitted an unprovoked actual bodily harm assault on a man at the Garage pub on January 16, 2009.

He repeatedly punched Ryan Leopard-Sheffield leaving him with cuts, bruises and a chipped tooth.

The judge, Recorder Jonathan Sandiford, saw it was Ewart’s subterfuge which earned him the jail term rather than the violence.

He said: “I’m afraid this was not the panicked reaction of somebody giving a false name to the police station.

“It was a pre-meditated, determined and well-planned attack on the court process. It involved the manufacture of evidence. It was persisted in.”

He said it was sinister that Ewart’s solicitors were given the names of people in the photographs to seek statements backing up his lies.

“It’s plain to me that to have any chance of success this scheme would have had to have involved persuading those individuals to give false evidence to say that that was your 21st birthday party.

“In fact, as we know now, it must have been staged at a later point.

“It has been said many times that the court process must be protected,” added the judge.

“And you transformed what was a case involving two bad enough incidents of violence into something more serious.”

Ewart, who had only one previous conviction, was jailed for two-and-a-half years, his first prison sentence, including 18 months for the deception.

Jonathan Walker, defending, said: “It appears to be a fairly determined attempt to warp the smooth running of the criminal justice system.

“The ill-judged stupidity started to unravel when he approached members of his family who quite properly refused to become involved in their son’s folly.

“It became abundantly clear that this was an ill-judged attempt to ramp up what he believed was a proper defence.”

He added Ewart apologised for his “drunken and thuggish activities”, was not inherently violent and had not been violent in the last 18 months.

Ewart was otherwise amiable, industrious, hard-working with strong family support and character references.

Mr Walker said on the day of the 2008 affray Ewart had been to the funeral of a friend whom he had found dead.
Gazette Live

From 2010.

Stephen Bracher had been working on 17 other devices, police said

Stephen Bracher had been working on 17 other devices, police said

A man found with a 9kg (20lb) fertiliser bomb under his bed has been jailed for 40 months.

Unemployed amphetamine addict Stephen Bracher, 55, had been working on 17 other devices when he was arrested in January, Exeter Crown Court heard.

Bracher admitted three counts of having explosive substances, one of possessing a lock knife and one of possessing amphetamines.

Police found jottings which indicated extreme hatred of black and gay people.

In some he expressed intentions of killing people, the court heard.

Bracher's house was "full of weaponry" including machetes and knives

Bracher’s house was “full of weaponry” including machetes and knives

Royal Navy explosives experts removed the explosives from his home in Bishops Tawton, near Barnstaple, after the raid on 24 January.

The property was also “full of weaponry” including machetes and knives, police said.

The ammonia sulphate fertiliser bomb, when exploded under controlled conditions, left a large hole in the ground.

Police said fertiliser bomb and the other devices could have caused “extensive damage”.

Det Insp Phil Gray said: “He had disassociated himself from society.

“He enjoyed making his own explosives to see how loudly he could get them to go bang.”

Bracher told police the explosives were fireworks.

Neighbours and friends of Bracher spoke of an unemployed loner who spent hours with a metal detector by the nearby River Taw.

There he would search for finds which he would take to Barnstaple Museum.

He had a “genuine” interest in local history and was not in it for money, said one museum worker.

Bracher was the eldest of three children and lived in the area all his life, said friend Mike Davis, who has known him since they were teenagers.

Last year Bracher’s builder brother Alan died, which had affected him “severely”, said Mr Davis.

Mr Davis said: “He was a very reasonable person, no trouble maker.

“He didn’t want to do damage to anyone – he’s not a terrorist kind of person, he wouldn’t harm anyone.”

The almshouses where Bracher lived are reserved for people aged over 45 with local connections.

Neighbour Glyn Seal said it was a “big surprise” when the almshouses, with their manicured lawns and clipped hedges, were raided and Bracher was arrested.

“It’s a quiet community and the people in the almshouses are very quiet,” he said. “You never hear anything from them.”

BBC News

Geoffrey Ewart, from Grangetown, left one girl scarred for life after bombing around Scarborough in a BMW 330

Geoff Ewart appeared at York Crown Court to admit a dangerous driving charge

Geoff Ewart appeared at York Crown Court to admit a dangerous driving charge

A banned drink-driver who seriously injured two teenage girls in a seaside horror crash has been jailed.

Geoffrey Ewart, from Grangetown, bombed around Scarborough in a BMW 330 when the car careered off the road and tumbled down a steep embankment.

The 30-year-old – who ignored his passengers’ frantic pleas to stop – ran from the wrecked vehicle, leaving the two girls trapped inside.

Prosecutor Andrew Semple said one of them suffered catastrophic injuries including broken bones and was left immobile for weeks.

Mr Semple said the car, which had come off its wheels, had £12,500 of damage in the smash on Castle Road on June 24 last year.

Police found Ewart at a nearby taxi rank at about 1am.

Ewart, of Grisedale Crescent, was breathalysed three hours later by which time his alcohol level had dipped, but experts worked out that at the time of the accident he would have been about one-and-a-half times over the drink-drive limit.

The offshore oil rigger admitted causing serious injury by dangerous driving, aggravated vehicle-taking, drink-driving, having no insurance and driving while disqualified.

Ewart once faked own 21st birthday party to evade justice

York Crown Court heard that the BMW belonged to Ewart’s father and that his son had taken it without his consent before setting off for Scarborough.

After picking up his passengers, he began to drive “very fast”.

Mr Semple said: “One of the girls said her head was forced back into the seat by his speed.”

He rejected their pleas to let them out before the car left the road and clattered through bushes as it rolled down the embankment.

The older girl suffered a broken shoulder and fractured pelvis.

Her injuries were so serious she was transferred to James Cook University Hospital in Middlesbrough where she underwent several operations, had two blood transfusions and remained bed-bound for three weeks.

It was another six weeks before she could move without a wheelchair or crutches.

She was left scarred for life with a 14cm injury on her arm.

The younger girl suffered whiplash injuries and had to undergo 10 weeks of physio.

Scarborough crash followed ‘night of sheer stupidity and madness’

Ewart had three convictions including one for violence and perverting the course of justice in 2010, when he was jailed for punching a man repeatedly during a street brawl in Middlesbrough.

Ewart tried to evade justice on that occasion by faking his own 21st birthday party and using falsified photos from the pub ‘shindig’ in a forlorn attempt to convince police he was elsewhere at the time of the incident.

Following his release from prison in December 2014, he was caught drink-driving and given a 12-month ban.

Ewart’s barrister James Kemp said the horror crash in Scarborough followed a “night of sheer stupidity and madness”.

But Judge Richard Wright QC slammed Ewart for his “dangerous, show-off” driving and “callous” decision to leave the girls in the car as he fled the scene.

“You have shown little or no remorse towards your victims,” he added.

Ewart was jailed for two years and eight months, and given a five-year driving ban.

Gazette Live

From 2016.

A man has been jailed after violence flared during a march and counter demonstration in Sunderland.

Police made three arrests on Saturday afternoon following disorder in the city centre.

The Wearside-based Justice for the Women and Children Group, which campaigns against sexual violence and assault, organised a march through the city centre, which was joined by members of the Democratic Football Lads Alliance (DFLA).

March organiser Tasha Allan defended the group’s involvement in the protest: “The football lads are not racist, they have proved that,” she said.

“Just because somebody has said somebody is racist does not mean they are.”

The two groups marched down Fawcett Street before turning up up High Street West to make their way to the former Crowtree Leisure Centre site for a rally addressed by speakers including UKIP leader Gerard Batten.

Previous Justice for Women and Children Group protests have passed off without incident but trouble erupted on Saturday when the march reached Keel Square, where a counter demo organised by Sunderland Unites and Stand Up To Racism North East was taking place.

Some protesters defied the efforts of march stewards and tried to break through police lines which separated the two groups.

Two of the three men who were arrested were charged with assaulting a police officer.

Lee Graham Parkinson, 36, of no fixed abode, appeared before South Tyneside Magistrates Court this morning and pleaded guilty to the charge.

He was jailed for 12 weeks, with a further 12 weeks to run consecutively imposed for breach of a suspended sentence.

Fifty-eight-year-old Thomas Allen, of Hartside Road, Sunderland, who was also charged with assaulting a police officer, will appear before South Tyneside Magistrates on Monday, October 15.

A third man, aged 24, has been served with a fixed penalty notice for disorderly behaviour.

Sunderland Echo

Mark Grogan had been drinking and admitted giving son a “good hiding”

A father has been given a suspended jail sentence after he assaulted his son with a baseball bat and threatened him with a machete.

Leeds Crown Court heard Mark Grogan had been out earlier drinking with his son Alex without any problem on January 15.

His son and a friend had returned with Grogan to his flat in Dewsbury where the drinking continued until the early hours. After the friend left both men fell asleep.

Bashir Ahmed, prosecuting, said the problems began when Grogan woke up and realised two treasured air rifles had gone and blamed his son or the son’s friend.

That led to an argument which culminated in Grogan pinning his son against a wall. He managed to get free and said he was leaving.

He had brought his dog with him and put it on the lead but as they were going Grogan partly shut the door trapping the dog’s paw. His son told him to leave the dog alone but Grogan then picked up the baseball bat and began to hit his son with it in the hall.

“At one point he hit him on the left leg causing him to fall over in pain,” said Mr Ahmed. He was also shouting: “I’m going to sort you out good and proper.”

His victim was struck again until he was crying and crawling on the floor towards the door only to be dragged back by Grogan.

He only managed to get away when his father went into the living room and as he got out saw Grogan was behind him waving a machete shouting: “When I get my hands on you I’m going to kill you.”

Alex Grogan, 20 at the time, managed to ring a relative for help and the police. When his father was arrested and interviewed he accepted giving his son “a good hiding, I just flipped.” He said if he had been sober it would never have happened.

Anastasis Tassou, representing Grogan, said his client had been drinking and he was upset about the air rifles but accepted he should have handled things differently. It was an isolated incident but the result had been a split in the family.

Grogan, 45 of Alexandra Crescent, Dewsbury, admitted assault causing actual bodily harm and threatening with an offensive weapon. He was given a total of 21 months in prison suspended for two years with 175 hours unpaid work and ordered to pay £300 compensation to his son.

Judge Mushtaq Khokhar said it was only his good fortune his son had not suffered even more serious injuries. But if Grogan was jailed immediately and lost his flat and job as a result it could only cause more problems.
Huddersfield Examiner

From 2016