Lettuce thief sentenced to six months

Shane Su­perville

A 49-year-old man has been sen­tenced to six months’ im­pris­on­ment for the theft of let­tuce from an Aranguez farmer.

Po­lice said the man was caught by a farmer at a let­tuce field near Xtra Foods, Aranguez, on Mon­day morn­ing.

Sources said the sus­pect was found with two large feed bags con­tain­ing the veg­eta­bles amidst the crops.

He was de­tained by the farmer un­til po­lice ar­rived.

Of­fi­cers of the Prae­di­al Lar­ce­ny Squad were called in and ar­rest­ed the man.

He was lat­er charged with lar­ce­ny of agri­cul­tur­al pro­duce by WPC Be­har­ry.

The sus­pect was tak­en be­fore a Port of Spain mag­is­trate on Tues­day, when he was sen­tenced.

Po­lice said the man has had 25 pre­vi­ous con­vic­tions for prae­di­al lar­ce­ny.

The let­tuce was or­dered to be re­turned to the farmer.

One of­fi­cer said they would con­tin­ue to se­cure the liveli­hoods of farm­ers, not­ing that pa­trols have been in­ten­si­fied to quell thefts.