Sponsored by
Charity shop thief gets three-month sentence
A WIGAN man has been imprisoned for stealing from two charity shops.
Brett Matthews of Laithwaite Road, Wigan, stole 20 DVDs to the value of £40 from Wigan and Leigh Hospice Shop on October 22, last year.
Wigan Magistrates’ Court heard that after trying to bargain with a shop assistant, Matthews, 36, proceeded to put the items in a carrier bag without paying and walk out of the store.
As shop worker Lancelot Allan attempted to stop Matthews from leaving the store, he was pushed to the floor by him.
An hour later at about 10.50am, Matthews entered the Shop Mobility store on Market Street and stole 12 DVDs worth £12.
Prosecutor Hanifa Patel said: “CCTV footage at the Shop Mobility store shows the defendant taking six DVDs which he had already stolen out of the carrier bag and place them on the floor.
“He then took DVDs from the shop shelf, put them in the bag and then put the DVDs he had already stolen from the other shop, on top of them.”
Defending, Andrew Stock said: “The defendant does take medication for anxiety but at the time of this offence, was trying to self-medicate.
“So this type of behaviour was unusual for him and it was never his intention to hurt anybody.”
Matthews received two concurrent eight week custodial sentences for each theft and four weeks imprisonment in relation to the assault charge which will run consecutively.
Matthews also concurrently received seven days for the non-payment of outstanding fines.
District Judge Mark Hadfield said: “This was quite despicable conduct really.”
Email to a friend
Print this page
Looking for...
Featured advertisers
Jobs
Search for a job
Motors
Search for a car
Property
Search for a house
Weather for Wigan
Friday 25 May 2012
Today
Sunny
Temperature: 11 C to 25 C
Wind Speed: 23 mph
Wind direction: East
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 11 C to 23 C
Wind Speed: 23 mph
Wind direction: East
Comments
There are 8 comments to this article
Page 1 of 1
EmmaUmfoofooAshcroft
Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 04:39 PMritchy thats proper tickled me that.... im crying with laughter about the cats dogs aunty comment. Cheers lol
spartacus
Sunday, January 22, 2012 at 01:22 PMSelf medicating? first time I,ve heard of that, why doesn,t he try arsenic, then we,ll all be happy.
jones66
Friday, January 20, 2012 at 04:21 PMobvious smack rat
Peawapp
Friday, January 20, 2012 at 04:09 PMDont allow it to breed. Obviously been a bad un for a while given he had already been fined for offences. What is the betting that we see his name in the paper again in the next few months. Amazing how many of these rats have anxiety problems and are on medication which obviously clouds their judgement?!
ritchy
Friday, January 20, 2012 at 02:25 PMalledgedly he was trying to raise £10 but could only manage £8.60 so went and stole said dvds to sell to make the difference me mates cats dogs auntys uncle saw it all unfold was quite a funny sequence of events they alledged
sickofitall
Friday, January 20, 2012 at 12:14 PMShould have killed someone with his car ...... would've walked then.
Dilbert
Friday, January 20, 2012 at 11:46 AM£1.40?
ritchy
Friday, January 20, 2012 at 11:26 AMall for the sake of £1.40 some people are thick, the funny thing is the dvd cases were empty ha ha
Page 1 of 1
Your view
Please sign in to be able to comment on this story.