Despicable
Sheriff slams ex-Scotland Under-21 keeper who stole £15k from his grandad
EX-SCOTLAND football star Charlie Adam’s brother was branded “despicable” by a sheriff as he was jailed for stealing £15,000 from his grandad.
Grant Adam, 30, embezzled 78-year-old Charles Adam’s cash while he was supposed to be looking after his affairs. Dundee Sheriff Court was told that ex-Scotland Under-21 goalkeeper Adam – who was with Rangers at youth level and has played for clubs including Forfar, Morton and Airdrie – had family issues which led to him misusing illicit substances. He also had a gambling problem.
Adam admitted helping himself to the money from Charles’s Post Office account while he had power of attorney over the pensioner’s finances.
Jailing Adam for eight months, Sheriff George Way told him yesterday that his crime was “despicable”.
He added: “The use of a continuing and surviving power of attorney is a powerful tool to help people who are becoming frail and infirm.
“There is a serious issue here. Someone has taken a decision when they still had capacity to place their trust in Mr Adam. He not only betrays that trust but also undermines the trust of the public in such things. This was persistent.”
He added: “You took it in £500 to £600 lots in order to fund your habit. I must mark this with a custodial sentence.”
Defence solicitor Jim Laverty said Adam had been affected by “various family matters” which had “turned what was an intrinsically honest man into a man who has taken this course”.
Adam, from Dundee, was originally charged with embezzling more than £22,000 but admitted taking £15,000 from Charles between October 2019 and January 2020.
He won six Under-21 caps and made 159 appearances for Scottish League teams before dropping down to junior level.
There are things I want to do such as travelling GARY LINEKER ON WHY HE QUIT BT SPORT ROLE
footballers of my generation,” says Gary, who turned 60 last year.
“I headed the ball a lot as a teenager in training. Then I made a decision in my early 20s to stop heading the ball in training unless it was absolutely urgent, but I used to think it was like getting hit on the head all the time.
“I used to watch central defenders. The goalkeeper would kick the ball miles in the air and they’d do 50, 100 of them on the bounce. That cannot be good.
“Would players have not played if they had known? I don’t know. Footballers have passion.”
Now committed to regular health checks, the dad to sons George, Tobias, Harry and Angus says things have remained steady for him so far.
He said: “I don’t think there’s much you can do. As time progresses, science is incredible and hopefully they’ll come up with some fixes.”
After a tough 18 months for all in the shadow of the pandemic, not to mention a full-on summer of sport, there’s plenty to reflect on from the fallout from Covid to the huge impact of the Euros both on and off the pitch.
Gary, who fronted the BBC’s coverage of an eventful Euros, said: “I think sport has come into its own. I’m proud of what football has done, and how the young players have done so much.
“Normally every four years we get the old, ‘Footballers could learn so much from the Olympians’ and I think it’s the first time in my lifetime where that’s not been the case.
“People have seen how impressively the footballers have handled things both on and off the pitch.
“During lockdown and this period, football has got the respect and reverence it deserves for the other side of things that it does. Yes, they get paid extraordinarily well, but these are working-class lads and they remember where they come from and their communities.”
With his latest eyewear edit with Vision Express featuring six pairs of glasses handpicked by the star out now, Gary says discovering varifocals has been a big breakthrough for his work with Match of the Day.
After a long time taking his spectacles on and off to switch between his notes close up and the autocue in the distance, figuring out there was a fix-all came as a lightbulb moment. Gary said: “It’s made such a difference. I don’t lose my glasses any more because I’ve always got them on. It helps with the cooking, too. I’m not constantly trying to find multiple pairs of glasses throughout the house. “That makes things much simpler, and prevents me from being late. Same goes for my sunglasses. There have been times in the past I’ve resorted to wearing a pair of sunglasses over my reading glasses. Now I have everything I need in one pair.” Gary had so much on he recently took a step back from one of his many jobs, giving up covering the Champions League with BT Sport. He said: “I wanted to free up my life a little bit so I can enjoy it as I get a little bit older, as I approach middle life. “I did it for six years. I loved it, but it was a lot of weeks and it was very tiring. There are lots of things I want to do, whether it’s travelling or doing things with the boys – although I’m not sure they would agree.” Just weeks away from his 61st birthday, the star says he feels lucky – and is glad he’s still able to enjoy a sense of the camaraderie he enjoyed in his days on the pitch through his work on Match of the Day. Gary said: “It’s one thing that’s difficult about finishing football, regaining that camaraderie you get in a dressing room. “We sort of have that. It’s a smaller dressing room but we still have that football banter as they like to call it. We have it between ourselves, the mickey-taking and a lot of fun. “Sport should be fun and I feel incredibly fortunate to have managed a lifetime in sport – and football in particular.” Gary Lineker’s new Vision Express Varifocals Edit – six pairs of handpicked glasses – is available in-store and on the Vision Express website.