Man Given Suspended Sentence for Machete Robbery and Police Assaults

A suspended sentence has been handed down to an individual who, while under the influence of alcohol and drugs, threatened an elderly man with a machete and subsequently assaulted him. Christopher Irish, aged 34, carried out the attack on the man in Bradford’s East Bowling district on 1 April, following a demand for his mobile phone. Proceedings at Bradford Crown Court revealed that he proceeded to assault three police officers and shatter a police van’s window. Irish, a resident of Bradford, received a 22-month sentence, which was suspended for 18 months. This followed his guilty pleas to charges including robbery, possession of an offensive weapon, criminal damage, theft, actual bodily harm, and three counts of assault by beating an emergency worker. Fuad Ashad, representing Irish, informed the court: “The conduct on 1 April was very much out of character for this defendant. “It was a consequence of the drugs he had taken and the alcohol he had consumed.”He was going through a difficult patch and, in order to deal with his emotional difficulties, sadly like to many people, he relied on alcohol and drugs to get through.” In delivering the sentence, Judge Kirsty Watson stated that while Mr Irish presented a risk to the public, it was “not a significant risk,” adding that a “realistic” possibility existed for his rehabilitation within the community.