SORRY I WAS IN A BAD MOOD, JUDGE TELLS THIEF

A JUDGE who jailed a cleaner for stealing pounds 23,000 from the building society where he worked has apologised to him and told him he got a "raw deal".

Judge John McNaught took the rare step of calling back Gordon Scott from his prison cell and cutting his sentence from nine to three months. Now Scott, 60, could be free within weeks.

The judge said he and the magistrates sitting with him decided they had been "unduly severe" after another case on the day Scott was sentenced at Swindon Crown Court. Martin Buckland, 27, had been jailed for four months after he stole pounds 10,000 from a club where he was treasurer. A further pounds 37,000 also went missing.

Scott was working as a cleaner at the Portman Building Society in Swindon last March when he stole the money. He found the safe open and in a "moment of madness" stuffed the cash into the panniers of his bike and fled to Oxford and then to London. He handed back pounds 19,000 and has since repaid all but pounds 1,000.

After the hearing his sister, Patricia Carter, said: "Gordon is very pleased. He is not having a good time in prison."

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