Criminal deemed 'significant serious harm to public' is spared jail for Gosport burglary where occupants were woken and threatened

Max Plaister, 19, was given a reprieve after a judge concluded he was curbing his ‘violent’ ways and was now ‘settling down’.

Plaister was handed a suspended sentence for his part in a morning burglary on February 11 last year at Selsey Avenue in Gosport.

Portsmouth Crown Court heard how Plaister and his 21-year-old co-defendant Rhys Curtis woke and threatened the occupants - who knew them - while demanding items.

The pair ransacked the house before stealing around £3,000 worth of jewellery and trainers.

Curtis, of Mill Pond Road in Gosport, was jailed for 34 months in October for the burglary and a separate incident where he crashed into two cars and a house while drug driving.

Curtis and Plaister, of no fixed address, had initially denied the offence before Curtis pleaded guilty to burglary in September.

Plaister was convicted of burglary in October following a trial before being told to appear at a deferred sentence hearing on Friday.

At the hearing Plaister also admitted aggravated vehicle taking of a moped that was left with ‘extensive damage’ and theft of a pedal cycle between December 31 last year and January 1. He also admitted handling stolen goods on January 1 relating to a bicycle.

The court heard Plaister also breached a previous detention order given to him when he was juvenile.

Despite the offences, judge William Ashworth opted against serving Plaister immediate jail.

He said: ‘The (probation report) says you still represent significant serious harm to the public. However, there is evidence you are settling down.

‘You are also fortunate your family has taken you in and given you a chance to get off the trail of repeated drug taking and acting violently.’

The judge, citing how Plaister was still a youth when committing the burglary, then imposed an 18-month sentence in a young offender’s institution suspended for two years.

He was also handed 150 hours unpaid work and told to do 15 rehabilitation days, as well as being banned from driving for 12 months and fined £100.

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Plaister’s co-defendant Curtis was previously sentenced for crashing a Ford Fiesta while drug driving into a BMW and a Vauxhall Astra and a house in Varos Close on November 5 last year.

Curtis was apprehended by police after running away.

The crash caused significant structural damage to the property costing thousands of pounds.

Curtis was convicted of three counts of criminal damage, failing to stop after an accident, failing to report an accident, driving while under the influence of drugs, and driving without a licence and insurance.

He received a 21-month driving ban on top of his jail term for the offences and the burglary.

PC Charlotte Pocock said in October: ‘These were all very serious offences, and I am pleased that both defendants have been convicted.’

A message from the Editor, Mark Waldron

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