A Dundee man who stole a trolley used to transport bodies from a city undertaker has been jailed for almost six months.
Andrew King took the £2,700 stretcher after it was left to dry in the yard of Affertons Funeral Directors on Clepington Road last summer.
Fiscal depute Sue Ruta told the court the funeral home’s owner placed the stretcher outside after washing it earlier that morning.
He found the stretcher had been taken and a review of CCTV showed the accused and two others wearing high-visibility jackets looking in the yard for scrap metal.
Ms Ruta said King was seen on CCTV carrying the stretcher above his head, having ripped the foam pad from it and put it in a wheelie bin.
The stretcher was taken to a scrap metal dealer and subsequently crushed.
King, 21, of Mauchline Avenue, admitted stealing a dispatch stretcher at Affertons Funeral Directors on July 2.
Not-guilty pleas from two other men accused of the same offence were previously accepted by prosecutors.
Jailing King for 23 weeks, Sheriff Brown told him: “Stealing metal is such a serious problem it leads me to consider a prison sentence.
“You have already had alternatives to custody the time has come for you to go to prison.”