3 yrs for brush-cutter thief

NICHOLAS SINGH, 28, will serve the next three years in jail for stealing a grass cutter.

He was charged with stealing it on February 11 from his fellow villager at Cedar Hill, Forres Park, Claxton Bay. Yesterday, Singh pleaded guilty before senior magistrate Cherril-Ann Antoine in the San Fernando Magistrates’ Court.

The magistrate read to him other charges of damaging the iron bars of the cell of the St Margaret’s Police Station, escaping legal custody, resisting arrest and assaulting a police officer. Singh pleaded guilty to all five.

Prosecutor PC Cleyon Seedan said, on being arrested the same day Singh confessed, “Boss I really take the wacker.”

After being charged, Seedan said, Singh was put in a cell in the St Margaret’s Police Station. But at about 5.50 pm that day, Cpl Mohammed saw that the iron bar of the cell Singh was was bent inward. The wooden bunk bed had been dismantled, he told the magistrate, and Singh was not in the cell.

Seedan said Mohammed and other police went to a trace in Macaulay, Claxton Bay, where they captured Singh. However, he assaulted Cpl Ifil and when Mohammed intervened, he resisted arrest.

Antoine told Singh that given his criminal record of 16 offences in the last ten years, it seemed he was not prepared to mend his ways.

She sentenced him to three years for stealing the brush cutter, one year for escaping lawful custody, nine months for assaulting a police officer, six months for resisting arrest and four months for damage to the cell.

She ordered the sentences to run concurrently, so Singh will serve three years.