A violent Fife criminal was caught in jail with a banned mobile phone after it rang in his cell in front of prison officers, a court heard.
David Gilday, serving 18 years for two serious assaults, openly admitted the device was his.
Gilday, who was convicted of a Christmas Day murder bid in his Kirkcaldy hometown, and then attacked another man with a hammer when he was allowed out of Noranside open prison at Forfar, had already been caught using an illegal mobile to thank taxpayers for his cushy life behind bars.
He pleaded guilty to possessing the phone at Addiewell Prison, West Lothian, earlier this year when he appeared at Livingston Sheriff Court on Wednesday.
Connor Muir, prosecuting, said prison officers were carrying out a search of Gilday’s cell when the phone went off.
He said: “The officers heard the phone on the bed vibrating and seized it. The matter was reported.”
Sheriff Susan Craig told Gilday via a video link that she would have sentenced him to an extra year in prison had he not tendered an early guilty plea at an intermediate diet.
She discounted the sentence by 25% to nine months but told Gilday it would run consecutively to the sentences he was currently serving.
Four years ago Gilday, 42, used a banned mobile to post snaps of himself on Facebook as he larked with fellow cons at Saughton Prison in Edinburgh.
He wrote: “Big thanks to all the taxpayers for making my life soooo good. Yipeeee. Hahaha!”
Gilday – who plastered his cell with Celtic banners and used the name “Dubbsy Bhoy” – added: “I know it’s the weekend, but I’m just going to stay in and party! :)”
He had an extra eight years added to his 10-year sentence in 2006 after he launched a hammer attack on another man after he was allowed out of Noranside, halfway into a 10-year stretch for a serious assault to danger of life.
He was convicted of attempted murder for the Christmas Day attack on Darren Flockart, 25, in a Kirkcaldy bar. His 10-year sentence included seven years for assault to severe injury and to danger of life.
Gilday unsuccessfully claimed his human rights had been breached after sniffer dogs found drugs in a card he was sent while in Glenochil Prison in Clackmannanshire.
Wardens said he’d get the card back – but only when freed, in 2025 at the earliest.
