Lewd act

Counselling has been ordered for a young man who was caught masturbating over a sleeping woman on Batts Rock Beach last weekend.

Kyle Obrian White, a 24-year-old labourer from Ricks Land, St James, pleaded guilty before Magistrate Alison Burke on Monday to committing the act in public on May 6.

Two women were walking in the area around 11:45 a.m. when they observed White performing the act. They walked passed and spoke to another gentleman about what was happening.

The trio returned and observed White still in the act, standing by the head of a female who was sleeping on the beach. He then lay down not too far from the woman and continued his act.

The man whose help the women had solicited called the police and recorded what was going on. He then went up to White and told him ‘don’t move, I call the police for yuh’.

White was subsequently apprehended.

When asked whether he had accepted the facts read by Sergeant Verdon Forde, the now-convicted man who has four prior convictions, none of a similar nature, replied, “yes”.

Asked whether he wanted to address the court, White, who also stated that he was not under the influence of any mind-altering substance, said: “I ain’t got nothing to say.”

However, he later added: “I just do it. I can’t really explain it now. I can’t explain it. I ain’t know what to tell you.”

Attorney-at-law Simon Clarke then intervened, as a friend of the court, on White’s behalf.

After speaking to the lawyer, White apologised for his actions.

“I sorry for doing it. It won’t happen again . . . . I did it to feel good,” he said before the attorney added that the offence seemed to be “out of character” for the convicted man.

Clarke then urged the court to impose an order for counselling through the Probation Department for White to get the help he needed.

“It is a serious act, an act that cannot be tolerated and won’t be tolerated. You can’t go to the beach and do this,” Magistrate Burke told White who said he usually went to the beach to “relax my feet”.

After White agreed to attend counselling, Magistrate Burke made the order that he report to the Probation Department. He returns before the District ‘A’ Magistrates’ Court for an update on September 11.

In the meantime, he is also on a bond to keep the peace and be on his best behaviour for the next nine months.

If he breaches the order, he will have to pay the court $500 forthwith or spend the alternative of three months in prison. ]]>