A man has been ordered not to leave his home at night for the next few months after he admitted stealing from a number of cars across Perth and Kinross and a property in Crieff over a four month period.
Thomas Brown was said in court to have used someone else’s Volkswagen Beetle without their permission so he could raid one vehicle parked in Perth he targeted over the period.
Perth Sheriff Court heard last week Brown was seen hanging around outside a property in the city’s Quarry Road waiting for the owner to leave.
“The accused was standing watching the complainer leave,” fiscal depute Nicole Lewis told the court. “The accused has then entered the complainer’s driveway and a smashing noise has been heard.”
Ms Lewis said Brown then took a quantity of power tools from a Land Rover through a broken window and loaded them into the Volkswagen Beetle he had taken without the owner’s consent.
She said Brown targeted two more cars over the same period - a Mercedes-Benz parked in Greenbank Road in Glenfarg and a Ford parked at Strathearn Community Campus in Crieff.
The 29-year-old was said to have stolen more tools from the first vehicle - again through a smashed window - and half a jerry can full of petrol and a saw from the second.
Ms Lewis said Brown was also caught red-handed trying to steal copper from another property in Crieff about a week after he targeted the vehicle in Glenfarg.
She said a complainer “heard a loud clanging noise” coming from the grounds of the Burrell Street property then saw Brown shoving a wheelbarrow containing a copper hot water cylinder.
“He has then challenged the accused who dropped the wheelbarrow and ran away,” Ms Lewis told the court.
She said Brown was later discovered to have successfully made off with a bicycle and a chainsaw during the raid.
Brown, of Greenbank Road, Glenfarg, pled guilty to taking the Volkswagen Beetle without the consent of its owner between October 11 and October 13, 2020, driving the car without insurance, forcing open two locked vehicles in Perth and Crieff on the second date and taking a quantity of power tools from the first and petrol and a saw from the second.
He also admitted forcing open another locked vehicle in Glenfarg and stealing a quantity of tools between July 28 and July 29, 2020 and stealing more tools, copper items and a bicycle from a property in Crieff on August 5 the same year.
Sheriff Francis Gill remarked he had considered imposing a custodial sentence on Brown given the nature of all the above offences but said a background report had persuaded him to choose other options.
He sentenced Brown to complete 150 hours of community service, placed him under the supervision of social workers for a year and made him the subject of a restriction of liberty order for four-and-a-half months preventing him from leaving his home address between the hours of 8pm and 7am.
Sheriff Gill also ordered six penalty points be taken from Brown’s driving licence.
He deferred sentencing Brown for the break-ins in Glenfarg and Crieff in July and August 2020 respectively until a review of his progress completing the first part of his sentence in three months time.
