Carried out bogus collection for charity

Charles Brendan Ward, Laurel Park, Galway, admitted that on December 14 this year he dishonestly made false representation with collection tins which had Marie Curie stickers on them.

The court heard that a member of the public noticed the defendant and another person acting suspiciously in the street in Armagh and told police.

When police spoke to them they said they were collecting for Marie Curie.

They had plastic collection tubs with them at the time.

It turned out they were not authorised and the amount found in the tubs they were collecting with came to the sum of £100.

District Judge Eamonn King said the men then had travelled all the way from Galway to operate a false street collection in Armagh.

A solicitor representing Ward said Marie Curie had been contacted and the defendant received a welcome pack.

He added that Ward had spent the night in custody.

This had been the defendant’s first time in the jurisdiction and he had no desire to be back again, the solicitor told the court.

Judge King described the matter in question as “a low action”.

He sentenced Ward to three months in prison, suspended for 12 months.

The judge also ordered that the £100 collected by the defendant in the bogus operation should be given to the Marie Curie Foundation.