Bag theft row ‘a lot of nonsense’, says Sheriff in her last sitting at the town’s criminal court

A WOMAN who travelled from Glasgow to surprise her chef at a Tarbert hotel was the one who got the surprise after finding that he had been seeing someone else.

Laura Campbell, of 65 Rosslyn Avenue, Rutherglen found herself before Campbeltown Sheriff Court last week after she admitted stealing a holdall containing clothing and a passport from the hotel on June 2 following the discovery.

Her defence agent Stephen McSporran said: ‘She thought she was in a relationship with him and turned up at the ho- tel to surprise him.’ But procurator fiscal Eoin McGinty said that when the boyfriend heard she had booked a room at the hotel, ‘he was unhappy about this and asked her to leave, but she was unable to do so as she had had something to drink’.

holdall

They arranged for her to sleep in his staff accommodation and for him to sleep elsewhere; he returned to his room the following morning to collect some work clothes from his holdall.

‘When he returned later it was gone,’ said the fiscal. The bag also contained his passport.

The bag was later recovered from Campbell’s car at her home in Rutherglen.

‘This is very unfortunate – just a lot of nonsense,’ said Sheriff Ruth Anderson QC in her last sitting at the criminal court at Campbeltown.

‘This could have been sorted out between you both.’

The sheriff gave Campbell an absolute discharge.

Mr McSporran said: ‘She wanted to get back at him and took the items in a fit of rage.

‘She is sorry for her actions.’