A Dundee man set fire to a car that belonged to a police officer’s wife while it sat in the couple’s driveway.
Craig Guest, 32, of Nelson Street, admitted at the High Court in Aberdeen that he poured petrol on the vehicle and set it alight.
The incident happened in the Ballumbie area of Dundee on June 23 2014.
Two other charges against Guest have been dropped.
These alleged he had conspired to set fire to the car in the belief it belonged to PC David Farr and had later attended at a phone shop in the city and asked staff there to remove data from the device in an effort to avoid detection and prosecution.
Co-accused William Handy, 53, of Middlebank Holding in Errol has maintained his plea of not guilty to a charge that he also set the car on fire.
Guest, who had earlier spoken of having debts, was given bail on Monday.
The trial had earlier been shown CCTV footage which the prosecution said showed Handy walking into the O2 shop in the Overgate Shopping Centre at about 3.39pm on June 24 2014.
Giving evidence, retail technical specialist at the O2 shop, Craig Coleman, 28, said he remembered talking to Handy about “resetting information on handsets”.
He added: “He asked if a handset was to be reset if all the information would be cleared.
“He did ask about text messages, photographs and contacts.
“I explained to him there can be back up storage if it is being backed up electronically.”
Mr Coleman told the court there were times Handy came into the shop quite regularly if he had an issue with his mobile and there would be other periods where he wouldn’t see him for months.
The court was shown further CCTV footage from the shop on June 25 2014, which the prosecution said showed Handy and Guest walking in holding cups of coffee.
The court heard a new iPhone 5 was bought and Guest’s data was transferred from his old iPhone 5 onto the new one.
Handy’s data from his iPhone 4 was transferred to Guest’s old iPhone 5.
Mr Coleman said he recalled both men had their contacts and pictures transferred from their old devices to their new phones.
The trial continues.
