MAN ‘TRIED TO HAVE SEX WITH BOLLARD’
48-YEAR-OLD SPAT AT PEOPLE IN THE STREET
A MAN spat at several people then “tried to have sex with a metal bollard” outside Grimsby’s Marks & Spencer store.
Richard Parker, 48, was seen “exposing himself” on the morning of July 16. Prosecutor Craig Lowe told Grimsby Crown Court: “It was at around 7.50am and as a woman walked along Victoria Street and sat on a bench she saw him walk along to two young boys and spit at them three or four times before they moved.
“Without any warning he dropped his trousers and was exposed. He turned around and she said it appeared he was trying to have sex with a metal bollard. He pulled his trousers up and approached her and then walked to a bench around eight feet away and exposed himself again.” The police were called and when Parker was challenged by members of the public, he spat at the woman and she walked away. In a statement read out to the court, the woman said the incident was “terrifying in Covid times.”
She said although the spit did not hit her - nor any of the other people Parker spat at - it was still worrying.
She said: “I thought it was disgusting because he could have been passing on a disease.”
On another occasion, Parker spat at council workers who asked him to move away from a building. Parker was using a window cleaner’s bucket to wash himself at the time. Mr Lowe told the court he spat at the worker and two of his colleagues “around ten times.”
At the time of the bollard incident, Parker was on bail for another offence in which he waved a knife around on Humberston Road.
Richard Parker, 48, was spotted walking on Humberston Road on April 9 this year brandishing a large knife. A woman walking with her young son on April 9 saw Parker “stumbling” and “staggering” down the road and trying to stab at passing vehicles. She described Parker as “oblivious” when he tried to cross the road and was dodged by a van.
Mr Lowe said that the woman called the police and then managed to flag down a passing police car.
He said: “The officer, a police dog handler, spoke to the defendant. The witness was described as continuously shaking and scared.
“The officer approached Mr Parker as he was waving the large, eight-inch knife around. He also had a smaller knife in the other hand.
“When he was asked to drop the knives, he threw them both into the road and he was arrested at the scene.”
Parker was charged with possession of a bladed article and bailed. Gordon Stables, mitigating, said Parker suffers from Schizophrenia, and although he has a criminal record, there was a long break between his offending between 2006 and 2015. Recorder Gumsley handed Parker a 12-month community order for the two public order offences and possession of a bladed article, and told him he must register on the Sex Offenders’ Register for the charge of exposure. He said: “In the present circumstances of people being terrified of people with knives and maybe having Covid, you going out in whatever circumstance your mind was in with a knife to spit at people is disgraceful. “It’s very difficult for me to clarify and make a decision whether you are someone with mental health problems that medicates with drugs, or if your drug taking causes your mental health problems.
“It is quite clear that when you are in a better state in yourself you can keep out of trouble but you need help.”
The officer approached Mr Parker as he was waving the large, eightinch knife around. Prosecutor Craig Lowe