Man jailed for one year after burglary of home

A 61-year-old man who claimed he thought a house was abandoned has been sentenced to one year in prison after admitting to burglary.

Andrew Carmichael, of Princess Royal Avenue, Pine, St Michael, entered the house looking for “old things” to sell. Now he will spend the next year in Dodds for committing burglary on July 15.  

Brought before Magistrate Manila Renee in the No. 2 District ‘A’ Magistrates’ Court on Monday he pleaded guilty to entering the residence of Lucille Bellamy and stealing two gas bottles valued at $80.  

Prosecutor Sergeant Gazelda Knights told the court that the complainant received a telephone call from a neighbour that the door was open and the house appeared as though it had been broken into. The complainant went to the house, found the door pulled off its hinges and contacted the police. During their investigations, a witness informed them that they had seen Carmichael walking along the road carrying two gas bottles.  

The accused was taken into custody and admitted to the charge.  

“The house looked like no one was living in it and I was looking for old things to sell. I would like a warning ma’am. I will not do it again,” he told the court.  

But Magistrate Renee pointed to his 17 previous convictions, the last of which was in 2022, for which he had received a two year prison sentence.  

“Your conviction card goes back some time and it seems the only time there is peace from you is when you are put up. You have not even been out of prison that long and now you are just going into people’s houses and taking up things,” she said, ordering him to serve one year behind bars. 

(JB)