CCTV footage showed phone theft

A MAN with a history at the Psychiatric Hospital was sent back there on Tuesday, after being released two weeks ago.

Steve Gordon Miller, 39, of Garden Land, Country Road, St Michael, admitted stealing a $700 cell phone belonging to a 14-year-old on February 18.

Prosecutor Constable Kenmore Phillips told the District “A” Magistrates’ Court the teenager went to lunch at Café Sol Restaurant, St Lawrence Main Road, Christ Church, with his older sister and parents. He went to the bathroom and left his iPhone 5S on a ledge.

The boy was at the sink when he saw the thief enter the bathroom. When the teen got back to the table, he realised the phone was missing, but when he went back to the bathroom it was already gone. A review of the restaurant’s CCTV footage showed Miller leaving with the phone.

When he was arrested the following night in St Lawrence Gap, Miller told police he had sold the phone to an employee of Massy Supermarket in Worthing. The phone was recovered.

Magistrate Kristie Cuffy-Sargeant remanded him to the Black Rock institution for observation. He returns on March 12.