Shoplifters appear in sheriff court

Three men appeared at Fort William Sheriff Court last week for sentencing in connection with various shoplifting offences in the Co-op store and the McColl’s shop, both in Caol.

David O’Hara, 25, of Kilmallie Road, Caol, pleaded guilty to stealing a quantity of alcohol from the McColl’s shop on November 18, 2017. His plea of not guilty to stealing a bottle of whisky from the Co-op in Caol the same day was accepted by the Crown.

Procurator Fiscal Robert Weir told the court O’Hara had stolen some wine and cans of lager worth around £15. He had been spotted on CCTV and reported to police.

A further charge, which O’Hara also admitted, of possessing ecstasy, stemmed from an unrelated matter when O’Hara was in a police cell on June 3 this year and the cell area was searched. Five ecstasy tablets with a value of £25 were discovered.

Defence agent Hamish Melrose said O’Hara was a single, unemployed man, adding: ‘The offences were of a relatively low value but when taken together there is obviously a concern.’

Sheriff Eilidh MacDonald fined O’Hara £485, which included a monetary penalty of £150 following a review of a Community Payback Order.

Aidan Maclean-Stewart, 22, of Bute Place, Fort William pleaded guilty to stealing alcohol, also from McColl’s in Caol, on November 18 last year, and that he did this while on bail.

Maclean-Stewart was also sentenced for injuring his partner by kicking a door and crushing her hand against a wall on April 15 last year at his then home address in Fort William, which he had previously admitted at an earlier court appearance; behaving in a threatening or abusive manner on April 11 at the same address by shouting and swearing at his partner and holding a kitchen knife to his own throat and threatening to kill himself, which he also admitted previously; and to damaging a vehicle in Kennedy Road, Fort William on September 16, 2017, and to which he pleaded guilty at an earlier court appearance.

Maclean-Stewart also admitted breaching bail.

Sheriff MacDonald told Maclean-Stewart he had cases accumulating ‘left, right and centre’. She fined him £470, ordered him to do 100 hours of unpaid work as a direct alternative to custody, and admonished him on the breach of bail.

Scott Crichton, 26, a single man employed as a window cleaner, who now lives in Inverroy, also pleaded guilty to stealing an item of food on November 18 at the Co-op in Caol.

The Procurator Fiscal told the court that Crichton had been spotted on CCTV taking something from the frozen section, which turned out to be some reduced turkey meat with a value of between £1 and £2.

Mr Melrose said Crichton had been seen placing the item in a pocket of his jumper. ‘He then went to the check-out and paid for the rest of his shopping but not that item,’ added Mr Melrose.

Crichton commented from the dock it had been an ‘absent-minded mistake’ on his part.

Sheriff MacDonald fined him £90.