Telford shoplifter re-sentenced for assaults

Keeley Amanda Waters had previously pleaded guilty to a charge of stealing two bottles of perfume worth £90 from Debenhams in Telford Town Centre on July 10.

At her sentencing on Friday, Telford Magistrates Court heard that the theft put Waters in breach of two conditional discharges for criminal damage, theft and two assaults.

Mrs Sara Beddows, prosecuting, said that the assaults had taken place in April and May last year when the defendant was 19.

In one case Waters, of Hamlet Close, Oakengates, had assaulted a child who had been playing with a friend outside in Woodside by pinning them to a wall.

In the second case she had pushed another child up against the window of a youth centre.

Waters had also been convicted of criminal damage after cracking a porch window during an incident in June 2014 when she had stood outside of a family's home shouting that they had "no right to live in Woodside" said Mrs Beddows.

The court was told that Waters, now aged 20, had also received a conditional discharge for a theft that took place in Tesco in Madeley in March 2015 when she was caught by security staff with a bag full of low value items.

Magistrates gave her a 12-month community order with 30 days of rehabilitation activity and ordered her to pay £135 prosecution costs plus £210 of various court charges.

Mr Jonathan Mason, for Waters, said that she had not been the subject of probation intervention.

"She's crying out for some sort of help," he said.

He said that Waters had been unable to explain her offending, especially the shoplifting, as she was not a drug user which was normally the reason for most offenders.

"I suspect a lot of her offending is down to her inability to cope with daily life as she sees it," he added.