A man charged with firing a crossbow at Dundee police officers in an alleged murder bid has been ordered to stand trial.
Michael Ley, 34, allegedly endangered the lives of police deployed to the Whitfield area of the city on March 14.
Armed officers were dispatched to Earlston Avenue, with a firearm discharged during the call-out.
Ley was previously remanded in custody after making no plea in relation to the single allegation he faced on petition.
Prosecutors allege Ley assaulted constables by repeatedly discharging a crossbow to the danger of their lives in an attempt to murder them.
Ley, whose address was previously listed as Queens Hotel on Nethergate, made a second appearance at Dundee Sheriff Court via video link from HMP Perth on Wednesday.
Solicitor Jim Laverty made a further motion to release Ley on bail.
He was fully committed for trial by Sheriff Gregor Murray who continued Ley’s remand ahead of a further court date being fixed.
16 years behind bars
A serial criminal who murdered a Dundee taxi driver was jailed for life and ordered to serve at least 16 years in prison after his second prosecution for the attack. Steven Greig, 47, pushed taxi driver Mark Ward down a grassy slope and then repeatedly kicked and stamped on the defenceless victim’s head on April 6 2022, before abandoning him to his fate.
Hospital violence
A Perth hospital patient who caused £1,800 worth of damage to a ward door and caused a terrified doctor to press her panic alarm has been fined.
Convicted sex offender Neil Beattie admitted the vandalism and acting aggressively, shouting, and making violent threats.
While on bail on August 7 in 2023, Beattie pulled a door at the Esk Ward of Murray Royal’s Rohallion Unit off its hinges.
His solicitor Linda Clark explained Beattie lives with his mother in Perth and is subject to a community-based compulsion order.
At Perth Sheriff Court, the 39-year-old was fined £200 by Sheriff Clair McLachlan.
Former teacher sentenced
A former secondary school teacher who sent vile videos of himself to ex-pupils has been given a community sentence. Gilles Brown, a former history and modern studies teacher, was earlier convicted after a trial of sending lewd videos to three young women.
Predator behind bars
A Fife predator who sexually assaulted a woman with a crowbar and raped a second victim while she was sleeping is behind bars.
First offender Kyle Kernachan, 28, of Dewar Street, Lochgelly, attacked both his victims in Edinburgh.
He was found guilty at the High Court in Edinburgh of carrying out a penetrative assault using a crowbar or similar instrument on his first victim at Marine Drive, Silverknowes Beach, on an occasion between February 2015 and October 2016.
Kernachan was also convicted of raping another woman in January 2017 at an address in the Granton area of Edinburgh when she was intoxicated, asleep and incapable of giving consent.
He was acquitted on a not proven verdict of a further rape charge alleging he assaulted a sleeping woman.
Judge Lady Haldane told him: “Given the gravity of these offences a custodial disposal is inevitable.
“However, you have no previous convictions and therefore, self-evidently, you have never served a sentence of imprisonment.”
The judge called for a background report on him before sentencing and adjourned the case until next month.
Kernachan was on bail during the trial but was remanded in custody and put on the sex offenders register.
Swordsman
An inebriated swordsman set alight a hanging basket outside a popular Perth pub on a Saturday night. Inebriated John Swanson went on to set fire to a bin before boasting about his weapon.
Cocaine-driver
A drug-driver caught behind the wheel in Dundee while high on cocaine has been banned from driving for more than two years.
David Dawson, of Essendy near Blairgowrie, appeared at Dundee Sheriff Court to be sentenced.
Previously, the 50-year-old admitted the blood samples he provided after being stopped by police on February 2 last year tested positive for 10 times the cocaine limit and 16 times the limit of a metabolite of the Class A drug.
Officers pulled over his Vauxhall Corsa at 8.40pm on Myrekirk Road after receiving a report about how it was being driven.
Dawson returned positive readings for cocaine (101mics/ 10) and benzoylecgonine (800mics/ 50).
Solicitor Jim Laverty explained social workers did not deem Dawson to be a candidate for drug or alcohol treatment.
Sheriff David Hall noted Dawson was convicted for drink-driving in 2007 and disqualified him for 27 months.
The sheriff ordered Dawson to complete 120 hours of unpaid work and placed him under supervision for a year.
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