9:00pm Friday 3rd September 2010
By Sam Chadderton
A MAN who wielded a meat cleaver outside a Darwen takeaway has been jailed.
Scott Cathie, 23, of Sough Road, Darwen, had the weapon tucked down his trousers when he and friend John Finnie, 23, of Garnett Street, Darwen, took part in ‘drunken, unpleasant anti-social behaviour’.
Police were called to the Crunchy Plus takeaway on Railway Road after reports of two young men fighting and one carrying a knife.
Preston Crown Court heard that Finnie ‘did not know’ Cathie had the weap-on, but he had ‘started the aggression’ towards a mem-ber of the public who was a customer at the takeaway at around midnight on July 27.
Cathie had 26 previous offences, including battery and ABH and by pleading guilty to affray and possession of an offensive weapon, was in breach of a con-itional discharge and a suspended sentence.
He was given 34 weeks, plus 12 weeks for breaching the suspended sentence.
Judge Graham Knowles QC said his actions were ‘made worse by drink’.
He said: “I accept there was no plan, but not for a moment were you reluctant, you were more than happy to get involved.
“If that weapon had connected with that man the injury would have been terrible for him and the result terrible for you.”
Pre-sentence reports said Cathie’s first taste of adult prison had ‘had a much greater effect on him’ than youth detention.
Finnie had 18 previous offences including wound-ing, ABH, criminal damage and robbery, and he was on two community orders when committing the latest crime.
He had pleaded guilty at the first opportunity.
The court heard he lived an ‘aimless life’ watching TV at his friends’ houses and drinking too much.
He was sentenced to 18 weeks in custody.
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