A motorist has admitted leading police on a high speed chase through the Perthshire countryside until officers gave up through fear of causing a crash.
David Main, aged 29, admitted 11 charges relating to a cross-country crime spree.
As well as his dangerous driving – which including chasing police backwards for half a kilometre – he broke into business yards and hurled a drawer from his first floor window through a car below.
Now a Perth Prison inmate, Main was kept on remand by Sheriff Euan Duthie, who ordered reports before sentencing.
Depute Fiscal Matthew Kerr told Perth Sheriff Court Main’s rampage began on August 7 with the first of two incidents at his home in Clunie Way, Stanley when he hurled a drawer full of items out the first floor window.
It plunged through the rear window of his neighbour’s Peugeot.
Less than a fortnight later, Main drew the attention of neighbours when he began shouting, swearing and punching walls at around 10.45am.
Main smashed the window in a door, then used a metal pole to smash up his own van, causing £900 worth of damage with four blows.
Perthshire reverse pursuit
Mr Kerr said Main made off in the van onto an unclassified road containing a number of cyclists and farm vehicles on the road.
Police spotted him at 11am as Main drove past “waving as he went” and reaching speeds of 70mph on the 40mph road.
He sped past cyclists and after about ten minutes, stopped to shout at the chasing police.
He sped off again and officers noted he was “sweating profusely.”
He stopped and reversed at their car for around 200 yards before speeding off towards Tullybelton at 50mph, almost striking someone and undertaking cyclists.
For a third time, he stopped suddenly and reversed at police.
The pursuit-trained officer had to take evasive action and reverse for around half a kilometre to avoid a crash.
Main sped off again and upon seeing the number of cyclists on the road, police abandoned their chase.
At just after 11.30am, Main arrived at the Tesco petrol station in Blairgowrie and helped himself to over £120 worth of diesel.
Just after midnight, he handed himself into police.
Attempted break-ins
The court heard that earlier, on May 31 he was caught on CCTV trying to break into The Workshop in Coupar Angus’s Candlehouse Lane.
He turned his attention to Forest and Field Engineering in Blairgowrie on April 4, arriving at the company’s headquarters at Welton Industrial Estate with an angle grinder.
CCTV footage showed Main trying and failing to get through the locked entrance so he climbed the fence, leaving traces of ripped blue fabric hanging from the metal.
While inside the compound, Main managed to cause £500 worth of damage by cutting electrical cables.
Staff found the knife which Main had used and which still had remnants of his DNA on it.
Officers discovered him a short time later, sleeping in his car, wearing ripped clothing.
Main was taken to Dundee and during the journey, he called one Northern Irish police officer a “f***ing Irish b*tch,” before adding “f***ing cow.”
Guilty to ‘troubling behaviour’
Main admitted two attempted break-ins, damaging his neighbour’s car by culpably or recklessly throwing a drawer from his house and acting threateningly at his home.
Main pled guilty to driving dangerously, grossly in excess of the speed limit, overtaking cyclists and farm vehicles at speed, repeatedly braking suddenly and reversing towards a police vehicle causing the driver to take evasive action and stealing £121.51 worth of fuel.
Sheriff Duthie deferred sentencing until March 23.
He said: “It’s troubling behaviour from the accused.”
In 2017, Main was banned from the road, having been caught driving while disqualified and without insurance and was sentenced for taking off from a Scone garage without paying for fuel.
