'Burying head in sand will end in jail', sheriff warns those who shirk community service
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John Stewart from County Cottages, in Piperhill near Cawdor, was sent to prison this week after Inverness Sheriff Court heard he had completed just nine hours of a 100-hour community payback order.
The original sentence was imposed last year for an incident on January 23, 2016 when Stewart behaved in an abusive manner at a guest house in Inverness.
As well as his breach of community payback order Stewart (32) admitted further offences including twice failing to appear for court hearings.
On June 26 last year he threatened violence towards a shop manager at the Co-op in High Street, Nairn, who refused to serve him with alcohol because he was intoxicated. And in September he assaulted his partner Donna Gray at Jordan House in Nairn by seizing her by the body and pulling her by the neck.
Depute fiscal Ross Carvel said that when Stewart was refused drink at the Co-op he shouted at the manager: “Of course I’m drunk. It’s my weekend off. I should be able to by a bottle without being judged.
“When he was asked to leave he refused and replied: ‘If you phone the police I will leather you’,” said the fiscal.
Solicitor Rory Gowans said Stewart’s partner remained supportive.
Sheriff Aitken told Stewart he was given a chance last year not to go to jail but he had carried out only nine hours of unpaid work.
He said he wanted to make it clear that people who fail to carry out hours of unpaid work can expect to go to jail.
“You are trying to bury your head in the sand. But these matters will be buried today.”
He jailed Stewart for 18 months.
