A Stirling thug who chased drug debt collectors through the street with an active chainsaw while wearing a Nazi flag has been sent to jail for three years.
After drug debt enforcers arrived at his home, Cameron Hotchkiss, his father and a friend met them again in a city street.
HMP Low Moss inmate Hotchkiss produced a chainsaw from the boot of a car and pursued the gangsters while draped in a far-right flag.
The amateur MMA fighter sparked multiple 999 calls and has now been jailed.
He also admitted published bizarre videos on Snapchat about making chemical weapons.
Fascist faced enforcers
Fiscal depute Rachel Wallace told Stirling Sheriff Court: “At 8pm on June 24 2023, the accused was within his home address with a friend and his dad.
“Four men arrived at the locus.”
The visitors to Hotchkiss’ home were there to settle the friend’s drug debt.
Hotchkiss, his father and the friend later went to the city’s Cornton area where they met the men again.
Hotchkiss, 22, was spotted at 11.20pm on Westwood Crescent waving an operating chainsaw.
He was draped in a flag bearing a swastika and SS insignia.
Police received multiple 999 calls and traced Hotchkiss in the passenger seat of a Toyota Avensis with the chainsaw and flag in the footwell.
Solicitor Frank Moore said Hotchkiss only fetched the chainsaw – used by his client and father on camping trips – after his group “were set upon”.
“His father was struck with a weapon when he was still within his car.
“Mr Hotchkiss was struck by another vehicle.
“It was after he was struck he then went to get the chainsaw from the boot of the car.
“It’s accepted he started the chainsaw up and moved towards a member of the other group.
“This was an attempt to stop the attack upon them – that’s always been his position.”
Hotchkiss pled guilty to conducting himself in a disorderly manner on Westwood Crescent and Edzell Drive in Stirling.
Snapchat threat
Hotchkiss also admitted acting in a threatening or abusive manner between July 24 and 26 last year.
At a property in the city’s McLaren Terrace, he repeatedly posted videos to a Snapchat group, threatening violence and stating he would make chemical weapons and a “napalm flamethrower.”
Hotchkiss was seen in the footage mixing chemicals and setting them alight.
He admitted acting in a threatening or abusive manner again while on bail in August by posting messages making offensive remarks and violent threats.
The court was shown a series of the Snapchat clips posted by Hotchkiss.
Hotchkiss was seen mixing chemicals in a bucket and starting fires.
Mr Moore said the videos were made after his client was “quite seriously assaulted” by two of the people involved in the earlier incident and “reacted badly to that”.
“He’s certainly a young man who’s had a difficulty with alcohol and drugs – that is behind a lot of his offending.
“He’s made some dreadful decisions fuelled by immaturity in one sense, drugs and alcohol in another and in a sense anger and revenge for the attack.”
Sentencing
Sheriff Derek Hamilton said: “I’ve not seen many chainsaws for sale in camping shops.”
He added: “There is no alternative but to impose custodial sentences on each of these cases.”
In total, Hotchkiss was jailed for 36 months – nine for the threats made while on bail – backdated to last August.
He will remain under supervision for a year after he is released.
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