Burnley Football Hooligan Escapes Jail Because He Loves His Dog
IS that you in the “DEE 38” top biting off part of a fan’s ear at the Champions League final in Rome?
Football hooliganism was once the media’s favourite topic. One of your writer’s first jobs in sports journalism was to compile a “Year Of Shame” list. It turned out that the archives had one for each year and all that was needed was to look for any game in the past 12 months featuring two of Leeds, Chelsea or Millwall to keep it up to date.
The media loves talking of and talking up crowd trouble. You do get lunatics like “Dee 38” and one Michael Lewis, who breached his Football Banning Order for the third time when he went to a match at Blackpool.
Lewis’s case show that banning orders can work. But are they effective?
Lewis told magistrates he had come to the resort with his dog for a four-day break. He met a man who invited him to go to the match…
Lewis said: “I was not drunk, I was just a bit fresh. I thought my banning order was just for Burnley matches and international matches.
“I would not like to go to prison today. Years ago, I would not have bothered, but I now have a little dog, who is like a son to me, and I would miss him.”
He is sentenced to eight weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for 12 months, ordered to do 200 hours unpaid work for the community, put on a year’s supervision and told to pay £85 costs by Blackpool magistrates.
“Dee 38″ is thought to be like a dog to his family, also…
Posted: 29th, October 2009 | In: Sports Comments (2) | TrackBack | Permalink
