Alan Reid was spotted carrying the weapon by CCTV operators on the evening of Saturday, January 2. Police carried out a search of the area and arrested the 49-year-old on Academy Place, off Academy Street. Reid, who is also known as Gypsy Joe, admitted possession of a bladed article in a public place and was handed six months behind bars at Warrington Magistrates Court on Monday, January 4. Magistrates also told the defendant, of Winmarleigh Street in the town centre, to pay a victim surcharge of £128 and ordered the forfeiture and destruction of the knife. He has a lengthy record of previous convictions, and was most recently jailed for eight months in August 2020 for a string of bicycle thefts from outside the Cockhedge Centre.
Dominic Lyons A PERSISTENT thief has been banned from nearly every shop in Runcorn. Dominic Lyons was already banned from the Asda supermarket and three Co-op stores in the town following a series of convictions. Now he has been banned from all but two shops after another spate of offences. The 26-year-old was originally handed a criminal behaviour order lasting five years at Warrington Magistrates Court in April 2019. But Lyons, of Fenwick Lane, has continued to steal from shops and was convicted of three more offences at the same court on Tuesday, January 12. He stole meat and chocolate worth a total of £218 from the Aldi supermarket on Trident Retail Park and the Co-ops on Grangeway and Halton Road between Saturday, December 19, and Friday, January 8.
By Adam Everett and Nathan Okell
Clockwise from top left; Thomas Maher, Paul Ashe, Ryan Baker and Adam Lewis A HAULAGE firm boss who ran a major international drug smuggling operation, a drug driver who seriously injured a biker and a flasher who exposed himself to a dog walker were among the Warrington criminals brought to justice in December. Every month, the Warrington Guardian takes a look back at some of the court cases that have been featured in the paper in the weeks previously. Other defendants appearing during December included a prolific county lines gang, a dealer caught with £4,000 of drugs after a stop and search and a monster who imprisoned and tortured his girlfriend.