News / Brandished knives
A MAN from Sandwick who brandished two knives after an argument with a neighbour has had his sentence deferred for reports.
John Gair, of Central Park, admitted at Lerwick Sheriff Court on Thursday to behaving in a threatening or abusive manner at his home address on 16 May.
Procurator fiscal Duncan Mackenzie said the incident stemmed from a “spontaneous dispute between neighbours”.
The complainer first approached the 44 year old in a “fairly robust manner” about noise coming from his home.
After an altercation, Gair went into his house and armed himself with two knives before brandishing them in his garden.
The situation then ended and both neighbours went back into their homes.
Defence agent Tommy Allan said the source of the neighbour’s frustration had been noise coming from Gair’ s home.
The solicitor acknowledged that the complainer may not have known about the reasons behind the noise, but Gair admitted that his behaviour got out of hand.
Allan added that his client spent 30 hours in custody over the matter, but had no lasting “ill feeling” towards his neighbour.
Sheriff Philip Mann said the charge was “even more serious…if you purposely decide to go and arm yourself with knives”.
He said the potential for “things going disastrously wrong is very, very high” when knives are involved.
The sheriff deferred sentence until 13 September to allow criminal justice social work reports to be prepared, and he granted a crown motion for forfeiture of the two knives.
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