Warwick man caught with knife in public for third time jailed

Nigel Aldred appeared at Warwick Crown Court after he had pleaded guilty to theft and possessing a bladed article.

Aldred (32) whose address was given in court as Fire Street, Warwick, also admitted being in breach of a suspended sentence imposed in January last year, was jailed for a total of ten months.

Prosecutor Ian Windridge said that in December Aldred and another man went into the One Stop shop in St Johns, Warwick, at around 8pm.

They bought a case of beer which the other man paid for – and then reached over and grabbed a handful of lottery scratch cards worth £16, which he handed to Aldred as they both then fled.

Then on February 2 the police had a call to go to Stand Street, near Warwick Racecourse, because of a report of a man making threats with a knife.

When officers arrived they found Aldred, who was clearly drunk, in the doorway of a house near Hampton Street, and he was asked whether he had anything he should not have.

Aldred said he had a knife, and reached into his pocket and took out a gold-coloured dagger with a five-inch blade and threw it onto the ground.

He was arrested, and when he was interviewed he gave ‘no comment’ replies to questions about the dagger and the earlier shoplifting offence.

Mr Windridge pointed out that Aldred had two previous convictions for possessing bladed articles in public, and at the time of the theft he was subject to a six-month suspended sentence imposed in January last year for one of those offences.

Simon Hunka, defending, said that following that offence, which had taken place in mid-2018, Aldred had stayed out of trouble for some time.

And the shop theft had taken place towards the end of the 12-month period of the suspended sentence – which had just ended when he was found with the dagger.

Aldred was jailed for six months for possessing the dagger, consecutive to four months of the suspended sentence, but was given a concurrent one-month sentence for the theft.

Judge Barry Berlin told him: “This is your third conviction for possession of a bladed article in a public place.

“At 2.50 in the afternoon you were threatening people in a drunken state, and when officers attended you had a knife and produced it from your pocket.”