Addict who conned elderly should be locked up indefinitely, says judge

3:22pm Friday 8th June 2007

A drug addict branded a danger to all elderly people in Britain has been jailed for more than seven years after his latest spate of sickening offences.

Neil McLaide, 36, had been out of prison for less than a fortnight when he went back to tricking his way into homes by posing as a fundraiser for cancer research.

Prosceutor Ewan McLachlan said McLaide told one of his victims - an 83-year-old man - that his wife had died of cancer five weeks before and he had been left to look after his son.

Bradford Crown Court heard today that McLaide has two teenage sons and it was his mother who died of cancer, in 1996.

McLaide has served lengthy prison sentences for similar so-called distraction burglaries involving elderly householders and Judge Roger Scott, who locked him up for six years in 2001, described him as an advert for the type of person who should be kept in custody indefinitely if it was allowed.

'You are a severe danger to all elderly people, male or female, in the United Kingdom for these distraction-type burglaries,'' he told McLaide.

'I have absolutely no doubt at all that when you are released you will commit crime again. You are, in my view, an advert for the proposition that you should be kept indefinitely in custody if it were allowed, but the Government only appears to be concerned with sexual offences or violent offenders for that.

'All your victims are horrendously affected by these offences. I don't think you really care. I appreciate you say you are embarrassed and ashamed. I hope it's true.'' McLaide, who should have been staying at Salvation Army accommodation following his release in December, pleaded guilty to three burglary charges but asked for a further 18 offences, including burglary, obtaining by deception and fraud, to be taken into consideration.

Mr McLachlan said the three offences on indictment involved two female householders aged 76 and 68 as well as the 83-year-old man - who was actually visited twice.

Two of the complainants lived in sheltered accommodation in Bradford and Brighouse and Judge Scott said McLaide had clearly targeted elderly people.

The court heard that McLaide claimed to be collecting sponsored walk money and, after getting inside the women's homes, he stole hundreds of pounds from their purses.

The 86-year-old man had his wallet containing £150 snatched from his lap by McLaide.

Mr McLachlan revealed that police had suspicions about McLaide at the time of the offences and his fingerprints and DNA were matched to cups he had used while at his victims' homes.

Barrister Stephen Wood, for McLaide, said he deserved credit for assisting the police under their 'clean slate policy'' by admitting the further offences which would not have been detected without his co-operation.

Mr Wood argued that his client's offending was not professional, bearing in mind the number of times he had been caught as a result of DNA left at the scene, and he suggested that it had been committed under the cloud of heroin addiction.

But Judge Scott described the offences as the 'worst type of burglary'' and said they were severely aggravated by the fact that McLaide had targeted elderly victims and was on licence for identical matters.

He jailed McLaide for six years and five months for the latest offences, but ordered him to serve a further 321 days outstanding from his previous sentence.

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