Terror as machete man runs amok in shop mall

A judge told 22-year-old Lewis Rimmer that he was satisfied he poses a significant risk of causing serious harm and jailed him for four years with an extended licence of three years.

Rimmer, of Harsnips, Skelmersdale, who admitted making threats to kill, affray and breaching his bail, will have to serve two thirds of his jail sentence before he can apply for parole.

Liverpool Crown Court heard that there was a background of bad feeling between him and his intended victim Robert Crinks after an allegation was made against Rimmer by a member of Mr Crinks’s family, which was never formally pursued.

Late on the afternoon of October 14 last year Robert Crinks was in the Concourse shopping centre in Skelmersdale as were other shoppers and children.

As he was going up the escalator he spotted Rimmer who was agitated and shaking and he left the premises.

About half an hour later he returned to get a drink and outside he again spotted Rimmer and hid until he and his friends had gone past.

However, inside the precinct he saw Rimmer who was carrying a machete with a blade about 2ft long and Rimmer shouted at him: “I’m going to kill you.”

Mr Crinks, fearing for his life, ran off pursued by Rimmer past shoppers and children in a play area before Mr Crinks found a security guard.

When arrested a week later after being found hiding in a loft space of a house, Rimmer admitted that he had chased after his intended victim “to cut him up.”

“He said if he had caught him he would have chopped him up and killed him,” said Bernice Campbell, prosecuting.

Rimmer said he had been “stoned” on cannabis at the time of the incident and the court heard that he claimed he was also under the influence of drugs when interviewed.

Sentencing Rimmer, whose previous convictions include assault, Judge Andrew Menary, QC, said that after initially seeing his intended victim he had left and deliberately armed himself with the machete.

“On the second occasion you chase him through the shopping centre brandishing the machete for all the public to see and threatening to kill him,” he said.

“You were determined to catch him up if you could and your intention was to chop him up and kill him. That was your avowed intent which you repeated several times.”

He added: “It is clear you are a dangerous offender.”

Kate Morley, defending, said that Rimmer admits intending to harm Mr Crinks but denies intending to cause serious harm.

“He did not want to kill him and would not have used the weapon.

“He was using it to frighten him.”

She said that at the time of his interview Rimmer, who is immature and suffers from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), had been under the influence of drugs and there was an element of bravado to what he had done.