A Carnoustie drink-driver was caught after suspicious McDonald’s staff tipped off police.
19-year-old John Gall appeared at Forfar Sheriff Court after he told officers he had had six pints when they found him behind the wheel.
Gall, of Thistle Street, admitted returning a reading of 151mg/100ml of alcohol in his urine, above the limit of 67,at Westway Retail Park in Arbroath on June 8 last year.
Officers found him Gall parked in a space at the end of the drive-thru with three female passengers after receiving a call from concerned employees and could smell alcohol on his breath.
Sheriff Jillian Martin-Brown disqualified the apprentice joiner for a year and fined him £335.
Murder trial
A former Fife College IT technician is on trial accused of murdering his two-year-old son. Lukasz Czapla, 41, denies murdering little Julius by striking him with a skewer, shooting him in the head with an air gun and smothering him.
Wallet wally
A 27-year-old would-be thief was found hiding behind a bin by police after getting busted breaking into a Fife home.
Dominick Butowicz, of Hillside Grove in Bo’ness, pled guilty to breaking into a house in Thornton’s Beech Avenue with intent to steal, while working with two others, on November 10 2020.
Procurator fiscal depute Freya Anderson-Ward told Kirkcaldy Sheriff Court the homeowner was on holiday at the time.
Neighbours heard “banging” and “the sound of breaking glass” coming from the house shortly before midnight and contacted the police.
The depute fiscal said: “Officers immediately attended and all observed the accused climbing over a fence from the locus and traced the accused hiding behind a bin of the next door neighbour’s.
“A few days later another neighbour found a rucksack in their garden containing tools.
“A wallet was also contained in the rucksack containing a picture of the accused.”
Sheriff Timothy Niven-Smith deferred sentence until May 19 for the production of background reports.
Five-hour egging
A Fife woman who, a court heard, spent five hours egging a Fife man’s home, has been fined £400. Leah Fleming appeared for sentence at Dunfermline Sheriff Court.
No room in the dock
Prosecutors are unable to set a trial for eight men accused of a “large scale stand-up fight” at Perth Prison.
It is thought no court in the Tayside and Fife jurisdiction is currently able to accommodate a trial against more than seven accused.
The alleged brawl is said to have taken place inside the jail on July 2019.
Lawyers for the accused men appeared at Perth Sheriff Court and each tendered pleas of not guilty.
Fiscal depute Michael Sweeney said he was not in a position to schedule a trial because he was having difficulty establishing whether any court had room for eight men in the dock.
“There are a lot of reviews going on regarding space in courts,” he said.
The case was continued to May 19 for further enquiries.
It is alleged that on July 23, 2019, the eight men conducted themselves in a disorderly manner, engaged in a large scale stand-up fight and committed a breach of the peace.
The accused are John Brand, 29, of River Street, Brechin; Dylan Ferguson, 25, of HMP Low Moss; Terry Barr, 32, of St Ninian Terrace, Dundee; Scott Dolan, 33, of Glenmoy Avenue, Dundee; Richard Gibson, 36, of Linfield Street, Dundee; Graham Soave, 33, of Dundee Loan, Forfar; Pavel Tomko, 25, of Northwood Crescent, Nottingham and Daniel Blake, 43, of Hepburn Street, Dundee.
Summer’s over
Cameron Mullen from Perth has been warned there will be no summer of “beers and barbecues” for him. Sheriff William Wood told the 21-year-old, who spat at police during a lockdown assault, his 7am to 7pm curfew “is not going to be easy but then, it is not meant to be.”
Kill threat
A Glenrothes woman has admitted making threats to kill her ex-partner.
Corrina Stevenson attended at the man’s home in the town uninvited on numerous occasions between August last year and February 27 this year.
The 59-year-old also tried to post a ring and note through his letter box.
The campaign of threatening behaviour came to a head on February 27 when she again attended at the property uninvited and shouted, swore and made threats to kill him.
Stevenson, of Craigellache Court, will appear for sentence next month.
The full caseload of the Dundee Crime and Courts Team can be found here.
