No more prison for wedding day thief
AHEROIN addict with 187 offences on his record will serve no extra jail time – despite burgling a bride’s hotel room while she was getting married.
Samuel Lamberton, 36, is already in jail until November next year for a spate of burglaries around Southport, but his sentence will not increase despite ruining the special day of Maghull couple Siobhan and Malcolm Lawson.
Lamberton, of no fixed address, smirked in the dock at Liverpool Crown Court as the judge, Recorder Mukhtar Hussain, QC, said his hands were tied by legislation meaning that if an offender has already been recalled to prison on licence, a judge cannot make a new sentence run consecutively.
He was given 40 weeks in prison, to run alongside his current sentence, after pleading guilty to burgling the Royal Clifton Hotel in Southport on September 22 last year.
A statement from Mrs Lawson, read in court, said: “Since this I have been extremely upset at having my special wedding day ruined.
“I suffer from anorexia which was made worse; I could not eat properly for a week.
“I will have to carry on knowing my day was ruined and my property was taken.”
Chris Taylor, prosecuting, told the court Mrs Lawson, 40, had left gifts of £100 cash h and d a £280 b bottle l of fA Armagnac in her room before leaving for her wedding at about 3.50pm.
Mr Taylor said: “She came back about midnight with her husband. The following morning, upon waking up, she realised the burglary had taken place and those gifts had been taken.
“This was reported to staff at the hotel who checked CCTV footage, which hi h showed h d a male forcing the door, entering the room and then leaving it.”
The court heard the incident was reported to police and a local PCSO recognised Lamberton from the footage.
He was traced to HMP Hewell in Worcestershire, where he had already been recalled on licence after a spate of burglaries, but made no comment in interview. Mr Taylor told the court that Lamberton had been convicted 68 times for 187 offences since 2001.
Richard Bannister, defending, said that his client realised he has “wasted much of his adult life”.
He told the court: “The affliction that causes these offences is drug misuse, which had been with him for a significant period of time.”
Recorder Hussain, passing sentence, said: “This was a particularly mean burglary as the victim in this case was staying in the hotel at a time when she was getting married.
“The property that you stole was gifts from her friends and relatives, and she left that property in her hotel room, locked it and had gone to her wedding ceremony...
“I have read her statement and she was clearly very badly affected by it; you ruined the day that everyone looks forward to and remembers for a long time.”
After the burglary, the couple decided not to go on their honeymoon to Croatia, as Lamberton’s actions had made them wary of hotels.
They were also unable to retrieve their goods, or compensation for them, as it is common practice in hotels that safety of goods is the guests’ responsibility.
As a goodwill gesture, the Royal Clifton Hotel offered a free weekend stay for the couple, to mark their first anniversary.
But earlier this year, mum-of-two Mrs Lawson said: “I am never going back there, it does nothing but bring back bad memories.
“When I found out we had been robbed, I spent the whole day in tears.
“It tarnished what was supposed to be the best time of our lives.
“I was also really distressed because the thief had been through all my suitcases and personal belongings. It was an invasion of privacy.
“It completely ruined the following day for us, and the rest of the weekend, as well as casting a bad light on our special day.”
A statement from The Royal Clifton Hotel, which was released at the time of the incident, said: “The management at the hotel fully co-operated with the police during their investigations.
“Here at the Royal Clifton Hotel and Spa we have extensive CCTV coverage of our property and we were able to provide valuable CCTV footage to the police regarding this incident which has resulted in the arrest of a member of the public.”