The Press and Journal (Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire)
Loan shark jailed for vicious hotel attack on victims
Aloan shark left one victim with a bleed on the brain and a serious knife wound after barging into a hotel room to collect cash he believed was owed to him.
Marcus Pearce appeared at Aberdeen Sheriff Court where he admitted violently assaulting three men and a policewoman after he tried to recoup cash.
The 28-year-old left one victim with a deep laceration to his neck understood to have been caused by a bread knife.
When police arrived, they also found the man with significant swelling to his head and his hotel room covered in blood.
Pearce was initially charged with attempted murder over the incident, which was later reduced to assault to severe injury, permanent disfigurement and danger to life.
While being placed in handcuffs, he stated to police that he’d loaned the man £300 but claimed he’d been told he couldn’t repay him for a fortnight.
Fiscal depute David Ballock told the court that at around 7am on November 18 last year a man, aged 70, was inside his Tillydrone home when Pearce entered and immediately began striking him to the head and body.
After halting the attack and leaving the man’s property, Pearce stated: “You better have my money by nine o’clock or I’ll have you dead.”
Later that same day at the Britannia Hotel in Bucksburn, Pearce was seen banging on the hotel room door of a second man, who he violently set about as he answered, striking him to the head.
As the man was “dazed and confused”, Pearce entered the room before punching the man twice to the side of his face.
He appeared to be angry that the man had given money to a third man, whom Pearce had loaned money to and demanded that he give him cash.
When the man opened his wallet and showed he had no cash, Pearce left and headed towards the room of the other man whom he ordered to pay up.
When that man also said he didn’t have it, Pearce attacked him, striking him to the face several times.
Hearing the ongoing attack on his friend, the second man called the police, who found the third man with a badly swollen and bruised face.
When they investigated the room, they found the bed sheets covered in blood.
A knife was also recovered and was found to have the third man’s blood on the tip and Pearce’s DNA on the handle.
The man was taken to Aberdeen Royal Infirmary while the police went to Pearce’s room in the same hotel.
Pearce initially refused to answer the door but, due to concern about the amount of blood found in the third man’s room, they got a master key from hotel staff.
They found Pearce safe and well but topless with his body and arms covered in blood.
Upon being informed that he was to be arrested, Pearce lashed out and struck the female police officer on the hand.
At Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, the third man was found to have a broken eye socket, a small bleed to the brain and a deep wound to his neck.
The second man was left with reddening and soreness to his face.
Pearce pled guilty to three charges of assault and one charge of assault to severe injury, permanent disfigurement and danger to life.
Defence solicitor Christopher Maitland told the court that his client concedes that his behaviour on that day was “completely and utterly unacceptable”.
“He was loaning out money to other people he knew at the hotel at the time,” the solicitor said.
“And because of his issues with drugs, he tried to get the money back and went completely over the score.”
Sheriff Graham Buchanan told Pearce that his offences “involve severe injury with a knife” that left his victim with “permanent disfigurement”.
“You also did all this with the intent to rob these men,” he added.
Sheriff Buchanan sentenced Pearce, whose address was given as HMP Grampian, to three years and eight months in prison, backdated to November 11 last year.