A Dundee maths student was caught with hundreds of obscene child abuse files on his iPhone.
The images and videos featured victims as young as two-years-old.
Dundee Sheriff Court heard that police raided Aiden West’s family home in Tweed Crescent after an anonymous tip-off that illicit images were being downloaded at the address.
Depute fiscal Lynn Mannion said officers arrived just after 8am on September 21.
Nineteen-year-old West, who was studying maths at Dundee and Angus College at the time, answered the door.
“Several devices were seized including a black iPhone with 255 files of child sexual abuse involving males and females, aged between two and 15-years of age, engaged in sex with adults,” Ms Mannion said.
A further 13 videos, lasting 48 minutes, were also recovered.
The fiscal deputy said eight of the found files were at the top end of the courts’ obscenity scale.
“Images and videos had been shared via Kik messenger and Telegram apps,” Ms Mannion said.
West was placed on the sex offenders register. He will be sentenced next month.
Boozy baker clipped kerb
A boozy bakery assistant was found out when she clipped a kerb in front of police in the early hours of New Years Day.
Skye Marnie was disqualified from driving for a year after admitting being over the limit when officers stopped her on Whitfield Loan, Dundee.
The “naive” 29-year-old was fined £400, plus a £20 victim surcharge, by JP Mike Reid.
Fiscal depute Dev Kapadia told Dundee Justice of the Peace Court: “The time was 2.45am.
“Police on mobile patrol saw the accused’s vehicle travelling towards them and briefly collide with a kerb and grass verge before coming back onto the road.
“Officers turned around and activated their blue lights.”
Marnie, of Fintryside in Dundee, failed the roadside breath test.
At Dundee Police HQ, she returned an alcohol/breath reading of 30 mics, above the limit of 22.
Her solicitor David Duncan said: “She was giving other people a lift home.
“She thought that what she had had would not be an impairment.”
“The mistake was very much hers. There is a certain amount of naivety.”
Baking Bad
A Fife drug dealer admitted to police that he supplemented his supply by selling counterfeit cocaine.
Daniel Hanley palmed off his customers with bicarbonate of soda, Kirkcaldy Sheriff Court was told.
When officers raided the 31-year-old’s home and the address of a family member they found he had 46g of the class A drug – but almost five times that amount of the common baking ingredient.
The powder – normally used as a raising agent in cakes and biscuits – was “compressed to resemble cocaine,” the court was told.
Hanley, from Leslie, pleaded guilty to being concerned in the supply of actual drugs and will be sentenced next month.
Warehouse rumble
A former Dundee warehouse employee burst a forklift driver’s nose when a workplace dispute turned violent.
Paul McGuinness wasn’t in the dock when he admitted injuring Keith Stewart with a single blow at the KPD Warehouse at Whittle Place.
The attack took place on December 6 last year, a day after a workplace dispute occurred between Mr Stewart and another employee.
Fiscal depute Dev Kapadia told the Dundee Justice of the Peace Court: “The accused is a former employee at KPB Warehouse.
“There appears to have been an argument between (the third party) and the complainer regarding the parking of a van.
“Words were exchanged.
“Then, the following morning, the complainer was operating a forklift truck.
“At this point, McGuinness, of Craigievar Walk, punched Mr Stewart in the face.”
The court heard the attack “caused his nose to burst.”
McGuinness, 42, wrote to the court pleading guilty to injuring Mr Stewart by punching him in the head.
In his letter he outlined circumstances, which were read by JP Mike Reid.
The JP fined McGuinness £100, plus a £10 victim surcharge.
‘Nasty abuse’
A Kirkcaldy man is facing jail for a “particularly nasty” campaign of abuse against his ex-partner which continued for more than two years after the relationship ended.
Stewart Urquhart turned up at his former girlfriend’s home uninvited, accused her of cheating and sent her chilling emails with images of weapons and the message: “Tell them I will be ready.”
Procurator fiscal depute Laura McManus told the court that on one occasion in July 2020 – about 18-months after the couple separated – the woman arrived home to find Urquhart outside.
The fiscal depute said: “He called her ‘disgusting’ and said she had been wearing underwear he bought for her while with other men”.
Urquhart, of Birch Tree Place, Thornton, punched a wall when she refused him access to her phone, Ms McManus said.
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