A teenager was jailed after threatening his grandmother’s parrot with violence for refusing to let him sleep. At Edinburgh Sheriff Court, Stefan McKinsley, 19, admitted a breach of the peace by repeatedly striking a parrot cage and wall. He had already spent the weekend in the cells by the time of his court appearance, so was ordered to buy his 71-year-old grandmother a box of chocolates to say sorry.
The court heard that at 2.45am last Friday, McKinsley went to his grandmother’s house to sleep in her spare room, where the parrot was kept, after a drinking session. “He thought he would try and get his head down but the parrot thought otherwise,” said Malcolm Stewart, the fiscal depute, prosecuting. “It started to squawk at him and he started banging the (bird’s) cage.”
McKinsley’s grandmother, named in court as Mrs Turnbull, tried to calm the situation by placing a cloth over the cage. “But by then the parrot was upset and Mr McKenzie was bashing the walls,” Mr Stewart continued. He said police found an upset McKinsley lying on top of a picnic table at the home in Bonnyrigg, Midlothian, shouting and “foaming at the mouth”.
Graeme Runcie, defending, said: “It would appear that if there was a cage to be rattled it would be his, not the parrot’s. Mr McKinsley spent the weekend in the cells. He has spent two days in custody because of a parrot upsetting him.” Sheriff Elizabeth Jarvie QC told Mr Runcie that his client’s grandmother must have been upset enough to call the police. But she decided to admonish McKinsley, adding: “I suggest you buy your grandmother a box of chocolates.”
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