Gang caught raiding house, thanks to call

By Staff Reporter

Last updated 14:53, Thursday, 21 August 2008

A GANG of thieves was caught red-handed raiding a house in Seaton after an alert neighbour called police.

One of the men was caught leaning into a window, another was arrested inside the house while the third was apprehended as he tried to flee the scene.

Carlisle Crown Court heard yesterday Barry Woolf, 26, James Clague, 22, and Gary Watson, also 22, broke into the property in Kennedy Road during the early hours of February 12.

The house was unoccupied – boarded up and in a state of disarray – after the previous tenant had left five days earlier.

Judge Paul Batty QC was told that the defendants had gone into the house to drink or look at fish they suspected of still being inside.

Clague had denied the charges – claiming he did not know the other two were inside the property – but was found guilty following a trial. The others admitted burglary.

Woolf, of Croftfield Road, Seaton, also pleaded guilty to an unrelated matter of common assault and causing criminal damage on November 27 last year.

Following a drinking session at a house in Cleator Moor, he punched his then girlfriend Michelle Little and held scissors close to her throat. He also head-butted a mirror.

He has served 187 days in prison for those offences and Judge Batty yesterday sentenced him to a 12-month community order, including a six-month requirement to undergo a drugs and alcohol rehabilitation programme in South Shields.

Clague, of Main Road, Seaton, was sentenced to a 12-month community order and ordered to carry out 100 hours of unpaid work in the community. He also has a curfew, banning him from leaving his home between 8pm and 6am for the next three months and must pay £400 towards prosecution costs.

Watson, of Inner Ling Road, Workington, has the same curfew and community order. He too must carry out 100 hours’ unpaid work.