A FORMER Powys firefighter has been jailed for a year after attacking police officers and attempting to grab their Taser stun gun. Barrie Thomas Wilks – who now goes by the first name Mallory and identifies as non-binary – was jailed at Swansea Crown Court last week for the April incident, which left one Dyfed Powys Police officer suffering a serious leg injury. The attack, which happened in Penegoes, near Machynlleth, on April 3, was committed just weeks after Wilks, 35, had been handed a two-year community order and fined £1,000 by Welshpool magistrates for assaulting two emergency workers during two separate incidents last year.
A SECOND drug driving conviction has landed a motorist a three-year ban from the road. Mohammad Shahekh Rahman was stopped by police driving under the influence of cannabis on October 21 last year in Newtown. The 26-year-old was driving a Citroen DS3 when he was stopped, with a drug wipe revealing he had 2.6 microgrammes in his blood, exceeding the specified limit which is two microgrammes. He admitted drug driving when he appeared at Welshpool Magistrates Court on Tuesday, May 11. Prosecutor Helen Tench said: “It was in the afternoon when officers stopped a vehicle being driven by the defendant. A drug wipe proved positive for cannabis. He has previous convictions, including a similar offence from 2016.”
Dyfed-Powys Police A MEMBER of a paedophile hunters’ group posed as a fictitious teenage girl to ensnare a Powys man. Darrell Swain was confronted by members of the group in Newtown in June last year and was subsequently arrested by police. The 54-year-old had travelled from his home in Ystradgynlais to Montgomeryshire to meet who he believed to be the 14-year-old girl he had been messaging between May 19 and June 1, 2020. Appearing at Welshpool Magistrates Court on Tuesday, April 27, Swain, of Ael-y-Bryn, Ystradgynlais, admitted a charge of attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child. Magistrates declined jurisdiction in the case and committed Swain to Mold Crown Court for sentence next month.
A NEWTOWN man is to appear in court next week after he was arrested for allegedly carrying out an “inappropriate act with a mannequin”. Dyfed Powys Police confirmed they were called to the Back Lane area of Newtown shortly before 5pm on Monday, April 19, and subsequently arrested 54-year-old David Huw Griffiths for a public order offence. He was charged with using threatening, abusive words or behaviour likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress and will appear at Welshpool Magistrates Court next Tuesday, May 4. A spokesperson for the force said: “Dyfed Powys Police received a report at approximately 4.50pm on Monday, April 19, of a man carrying out what was described as an inappropriate act with a mannequin in Back Lane, Newtown.