“I steal it your worship because I de hungry and dem didn’t want lend me $200 to buy food before me start work with dem,” a man, ordered to pay a $25,000 fine or serve three months imprisonment for stealing bearings, said yesterday at the Georgetown Magistrate’s Court.

Randy James pleaded guilty to a charge of simple larceny when it was read to him by Magistrate Priya Sewnarine-Beharry. When asked by the magistrate whether he had stolen the bearings belonging to Dwayne Jacobs from a Garnett Street mechanic shop James admitted that he had.

The defendant told the court that he showed up at the location on the day in question, August 3, to work. James explained that he was hungry that morning and asked three persons including “de boss man” to lend him $200 to buy food but they refused. It was hunger, James said, that made him steal the bearings from the mechanic shop.

The prosecution made no amendments to the defendant’s story and informed the court that the man had no previous convictions.

James was ordered by the magistrate to pay a fine of $25,000 failing which he would have to spend three months in prison.