A sheriff told a pair of brawling men “Dunfermline is not the Wild West” after hearing the pair were involved in a feud.
Barry Guthrie and Grant Macpherson were part of a “large disturbance” in Dunfermline last August.
Police were called after a gang began causing trouble in the town’s Abel Place.
Just days later the street was the scene of the “unexplained” death of a man found within a property.
The earlier incident forced a delivery driver to abandon his vehicle – which contained a three-year-old boy – and flee for help.
‘Ongoing feud’ explained
Fiscal depute Azrah Yousef told Dunfermline Sheriff Court: “The complainer is a deliver driver and is known to Barry Guthrie.
“There’s been an ongoing feud between them.
“At around 5.30pm the complainer was carrying out deliveries and had (the boy) with him.
“Something happened which caused the complainer to leave the area – he ran away.
“He went to a friend’s house and asked him to collect the van and check (the boy) was ok.
“He went back (to the van) and saw a window had been smashed.
“He saw Mr Guthrie and his co-accused.
“Words were exchanged in that moment but the two complainers were able to leave the area with the child and van.”
Accused was part of ‘reinforcements’
Solicitor Chris Sneddon, representing Guthrie, said the incident, coupled with the sudden death of a friend, had caused him to assess on his life.
He said: “It’s made him reflect on who he associates with.
“He’s now living a much quieter life.
“The window of the van was already broken, according to my client and it was an old van.”
Stephen Morrison, representing Macpherson, said there was “no particular love lost” between him and the complainer but he had not initially been involved in the “feud”.
He said Macpherson had been part of a party of “reinforcements” numbering up to 20 and was supporting his friend.
‘Dunfermline is not the Wild West’
Sheriff Alastair Brown blasted the notion of a feud as something belonging in the past.
He said: “There was a time when I was of the belief that a feud was of the 16th or 17th century in the Borders or the Highlands.
“On the other side of the Atlantic they may have persisted into the 19th century in the Wild West.
“But Dunfermline is not the Wild West and good people of this place ought to be able to live life in peace, without people like you having fights with others in a residential area.”
Guthrie, 21, of Leighton Street, High Valleyfield, and Macpherson, 37, of Torridon Place, Rosyth, admitted behaving in a threatening and abusive manner on August 28 last year.
Both men were placed on a curfew for 18 weeks.
