Court clears store giant

Shrewsbury Magistrates Court heard today that Shropshire Trading Standards had sent the boy in to the store to carry out a test purchase in the firm's Market Drayton shop. Woolworths denied the offence under two statutory arguments.

Deputy District Judge Robert Cockrell said he was satisfied the company had taken all precautions to try to avoid such offences and shown "due diligence".

He said: "It is accepted by the defendant there was an unlawful sale of the restricted product to an underage person."

Woolworths failed to satisfy the court on one of the two statutory defences. This was that its shop assistant Linda Till, who sold the DVD Rising Sun, had reasonable grounds to believe the buyer was 18-years-old.

Judge Cockrell said today: "I'm satisfied she did not believe the purchaser was under 18. However, the question is did she have reasonable grounds to believe he was 18?"

The court heard she claimed she was able to assess his age as 18 to 18-and-a-half. But the judge said he found it difficult to accept she could make this judgement.

He said "In my view, she should have then asked the youth his age."

But he said Woolworths had "an extensive and comprehensive" training system in place.

He said he did not think the company needed to use a safety barrier policy, as suggested by Robin Spencer, prosecuting on behalf of trading standards, of asking for someone's age if a person looks under 21.

He said: "On the balance of probabilities, I'm satisfied Woolworths did take all reasonable precautions and did act with due diligence.

"They have satisfied me in respect of their statutory offence and therefore the charge is dismissed," the judge added.

A defence costs order was made.

By Rebecca Lawrence