Newtownabbey: M&S shoplifter boarded bus to escape with more than £500 worth of meat, court hears
A shoplifter who boarded a bus in a bid to escape with more than £500 worth of meat has avoided imprisonment.
Joseph Hardy, aged 39, was given a three-month suspended sentence for the raid on a Marks & Spencer store in Newtownabbey.
A judge was told the Belfast man went on the stealing spree to fund his “appetite for drugs”.
Hardy, of Spamount Street in the city, admitted carrying out the theft on October 13 last year.
Belfast Magistrates’ Court heard staff spotted him and two others running from the store in the Abbey Centre with a trolley full of meat.
"They got away and boarded a bus,” a prosecution lawyer said.
However, police later detained Hardy and recovered a holdall containing the stolen products. A total of 39 packets of meat worth £535 were returned to the shop.
Defence counsel Garrett O’Kane argued Hardy has no history of previous large-scale thieving offences.
"He got into a situation of taking these items to satisfy his appetite for drugs,” the barrister submitted.
Imposing three months' custody, suspended for two years, District Judge Anne Marshall told Hardy: “Hopefully you are dealing with (your drug issues) now.”