A youth was yesterday sentenced to 15 months in jail after he admitted to snatching a cellphone.
Shaquille Mentore, 19, who was sentenced by acting Chief Magistrate Sherdel Isaacs-Marcus, said he stole the phone because he needed money to buy a bicycle.
He had earlier admitted to a charge that he stole the phone, valued $140,000, from Nicholas Gangaram, on January 17th, at Croal Street, Georgetown.
According to the police prosecutor, Gangaram was walking on Croal Street, heading to work, when his phone rang and he took it out to answer it. At the same moment, Mentore came up from behind and snatched the phone. When Gangaram realised what had happened, he pushed Mentore into a bus. Mentore then began running and passengers who witnessed what had occurred disembarked the bus and began chasing him. They later caught Mentore and retrieved the phone from his crotch area.
Mentore, who was sentenced twice before, told the court that he badly wanted to buy a bicycle that his aunt was going to sell him. “I didn’t have any money to buy the bicycle, so I snatched the phone,” the unemployed youth said.
Due to the fact that he was sentenced twice before on similar charges, Mentore was then sentenced to 15 months in prison.
