Shoplifter gets 100 hours’ of community service

In Nowra Local Court this week, father of seven, David Ronald Harper, 37, of McArthur Crescent, pleaded guilty to shoplifting.

On the afternoon of June 5 Harper walked into Coles’ Nowra store and proceeded to load a trolley with groceries.

He put Aldi bags over the top to give the impression he had bought the goods elsewhere and then walked out without paying.

Harper started to pack the groceries into his car when Coles staff took him back to the store.

When questioned, Harper said he had bought the goods at Aldi and Woolworths.

When asked why the meat had a Coles sticker on it, Harper ran away.

Police attended the store and viewed the CCTV footage, which showed Harper leaving the store with a full trolley and returning with a lighter load.

According to Coles management, the value of the goods returned was $306.19.

They estimated the value of the fully laden trolley as being between $400 and $500 and wanted compensation for the missing goods.

On July 1, Harper attended Nowra Police Station and was arrested.

In court it was decided that compensation could not be quantified.

Harper also received two other 100-hour community service orders this week.

One was for passing valueless cheques for goods bought on eBay. Harper claimed the situation arose when he bought a boy’s bike and had a girl’s bike delivered.

The online business agreed to a partial refund which it would deduct from Harper’s subsequent purchase of a pool table, but when time came to pay Harper wasn’t happy with the offer and the cheques (he paid with two) bounced.

Harper’s other community service order was for damaging a house he rented in Worrigee.

Issued with a notice to vacate due to a rental dispute over the place in which he lived for two months, Harper was unhappy as he claimed he had done work on the place without being paid.

A premises inspection found the place was dirty and had handwritten messages on the internal walls complaining that Harper was owed money.