News / Lost it and lashed out
A LERWICK man who was thinking of calling the police to stop a campaign of harassment against his family instead found himself in the dock at the town’s sheriff court on Thursday.
The court heard that 40 year old Stephen Charlton, of 46 Haldane Burgess Crescent, had been walking through Lerwick on 9 June with his wife discussing whether to approach the authorities about a young man who had been pursuing a family member.
Defence agent Tommy Allan said the man had been following his victim in a car, letting down tyres and harassing them on Facebook.
Things reached a peak in the early hours of that morning when he had burst into Charlton and his wife’s bedroom at 2am looking for his victim.
As the couple walked across Lerwick’s Victoria Pier that afternoon they came across the man sitting in his car with his friends.
Defence agent Tommy Allan said Charlton went across to warn him he would be calling the police unless his behaviour stopped.
“Unfortunately the complainer looked at him with a smirk on his face and Mr Charlton lost it and lashed out with one blow,” Allan said, leaving the man with a bloody nose and some minor bruising.
He said that Charlton immediately regretted his actions and cooperated fully with the police, but added that the harassment had ceased since the incident.
Procurator fiscal Duncan Mackenzie said the pier was busy at the time and passers by would not have known whether to intervene when they saw a “large powerful man assaulting a man unable to defend himself sitting in a car”.
Fining Charlton £200, Sheriff Philip Mann said that while he understood exactly why he felt frustrated and lashed out, his actions could have resulted in far more serious injuries.
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