A homeless man walked through Dundee city centre armed with a jabsaw because he wanted to get locked up.
Arran Farr had been released from prison the day before he was spotted carrying the keyhole blade in Princes Street.
Dundee Sheriff Court heard police were scrambled to the area at around 10.40pm on January 6, following multiple reports of a man carrying a weapon.
When officers approached 47-year-old Farr, he immediately showed them the hand tool – used for cutting plasterboard – and dropped it when he was instructed.
Appearing via video link on Wednesday, Farr was jailed eight months.
Sheriff Paul Brown told him: “Given the nature of the offence and your previous convictions, I do not consider there is an appropriate alternative to custody.”
Begged to be imprisoned
Weeks before the incident, at the beginning of December, Farr begged a sheriff for a jail term after he threw a chair at a police office window.
Farr saw red after he tried to hand himself in for a crime he did not commit on December 3.
Fiscal depute Andrew Harding explained how Farr told officers at Dundee police headquarters on West Bell Street he was wanted for a crime.
The prosecutor said: “It turned out that he wasn’t.”
Sheriff Jillian Martin-Brown said it was her intention to defer sentence on Farr until January to call alongside his other cases in Kirkcaldy.
“I’d rather just be jailed,” said Farr.
“There’s no point letting me out because I’ll just commit more crimes.
“I shouldn’t have been let out last week. The judge made a mistake.”
He was jailed for two months, but released on January 5.
Farr’s solicitor told the court: “On this date, January 6, he wanted a safe place to reside and that was why he was out and about with this weapon.”
Asked by the sheriff if this was an attempt to get arrested, the solicitor replied: “That is his position.”
She added: “He is an entirely vulnerable individual who has a history of drug issues and this is linked to his offending.”
