Friday 13 April 2007

o veggie steamer
you are cursed by this dread day.
peas are still frozen.


No terrible things happened today, apart from me being so cream-crackered I fell asleep on the tube on the way home.
I was reminded today of this cautionary tale reported in a local paper from my home town.

‘THE GREAT CURLY WURLY RAM RAID

… but drunk man discovered surrounded by chocolate on golf course had nothing to do with it

A man got caught up in the ‘Great Curly Wurly Ram Raid’ when he was discovered in a drunken state on the 18th hole of a golf course with stolen chocolate bars.
It turned out that Simon Watkinson, 27, of Bradley Road, Wrexham, had been on a big night out in Llangollen when he accepted a lift in a car that had been used to ram raid a garage near Corwen. But the only thing to be stolen in the incident was £40 worth of Curly Wurlies.
Watkinson was charged with burglary, but it was dropped when he admitted being carried in the stolen car and handling some of the stolen booty.
A Nissan Micra, stolen from Wrexham, had been used in a ram raid at Carrog Service Station, near Corwen. At about 7.30, at the 18th hole at Chirk Golf Club, a prone man was discovered by a greenkeeper with the sweets and an incontinence pad.
The story of the ‘Great Curly Wurly Ram Raid’ has been recounted in Mold Crown Court.
Someone had gone to the trouble of of stealing a car and reversing it into the kiosk of a garage near Corwen.
All they got for their trouble was a load of sweets, mainly chocolate Curly Wurlies, valued at less than £40.
The car was later found burned out and a very drunk man was discovered lying prone on a golf course, surrounded by Curly Wurlies.
That man, Simon Watkinson, 27, was originally charged with the burglary but the charge was dropped when he admitted being carried in the stolen car, and handling some of the stolen goods.
Watkinson was told by Judge Dafydd Hughes he had already spent some time in custody and that any prison sentence would be very short and of little use.
He was put on a 12 month community order, with 80 hours unpaid work, and put on an alcohol control programme.
Peter Moss, defending, said the court was dealing with the aftermath of the ‘Great Curly Wurly Ram Raid’ in the early hours one day in April.
A Nissan Micra, stolen from Wrexham, had been used in a ram raid at Carrog Service Station, near Corwen. At about 7.30, at the 18th hole at Chirk Golf Club, a greenkeeper found a man lying on the course. That man was Watkinson, who had been on a ‘particularly ugly night out’ in Llangollen when he drank an ‘incapacitating’ amount of alcohol.
he had seen the car doing wheel spins in the centre of Llangollen, accepted a lift, but got out at Chirk because of the terrifying manner of the driving.
The raid had already taken place because there was ‘an embarrassment of confectionary’ in the car. he asked for some and took them away, using an incontinence pad to carry them.
‘My client set off on the long and lonely walk in the direction of Wrexham, but was so incapacitated he had no idea if he was walking in the right direction,’ said Mr Moss.
Then, about 500 meteres from where he had left the car, he was ‘irresistibly assailed by the forces of gravity’ onto the golf course.
When charged with burglary he had said: ‘Frankly Sarg, I don’t see where the evidence is’, and that analysis had proved to be correct, said Mr Moss.
If he had been charged with being carried in a stolen vehicle and handling stolen goods the case could have been dealt with by magistrates.
‘If ever there was an example of how the abuse of alcohol and falling in with the wrong people can lead someone in the wrong direction, this is it,’ Mr Moss explained.’

(From the Wrexham Evening Leader, Friday Dec 8 2006)