Acting Chief Magistrate Melissa Robertson sentenced a man to one year imprisonment after he admitted stealing a guard’s shoulder bag containing several items.

According to the facts of the case Anthony Gonzales, 48, pleaded guilty to a charge of simple larceny which stated that on August 23, at Lombard Street, he stole a shoulder bag containing a cellular phone, a wrist watch, spectacles and other items totalling $81,500, the property of Carol Ross.

Gonzales told the George-town Magistrate’s Court that as he was walking along Lombard Street he noticed a bag hooked on a wall behind a store and he took it down and walked away with it. “Well ya worship I pass and see de bag and nobody din deh round so I hook it with a stick and tek it way,” he said. Gonzales said he then emptied the bag and threw it away. He went on to say that “She catch meh cuz she put another bag on de same place and when I dey hooking it again she see me.”

He then told the magistrate that “does wah I does do, I does hook things with me stick like potatoes and onion in bags right next to de place she [Ross] does wuk and I does wash it and sell it back foh mek money foh eat.”

Meanwhile, Ross told the court that she had worked as a security guard at a store on Lombard Street for over 20 years. She said on the day of the incident she went upstairs in the store and had left her bag in a basin inside the store’s compound. The woman said when she came downstairs she noticed that her bag was missing and started to search for it. She said Gonzales had told her that he had overheard someone talking about the missing bag and had immediately gone to retrieve it.

Ross said she then thanked Gonzales and told him to come back to her on Sunday for some money for his help. She said on Sunday she put the bag in the same position and hid behind a wall when she noticed Gonzales taking a stick and hooking the bag to take it away. She said that she raised an alarm and grabbed Gonzales and later turned him over to the police who charged him.

Ross told the court that being without her spectacles was a great inconvenience to her as she could not see clearly without them.

The prosecution told the court that the contents of the bag have not been recovered.
Gonzales then told the magistrate that he was imprisoned for four months on a similar charge. When the sentence of three years imprisonment was handed down, the man said, “Ow ah ask ya foh be lil lenient on with me, three years is a lot ah time in prison foh that.” He was later overheard saying “this wuk out real reasonable” as police escorted him out of the courtroom.