A woman who scratched a man with a hypodermic needle and offered him sexual contact in an alley has been jailed for three years.
Robbery in Redcar
April Syrett, 35, approached the man on his bike as he left The Halt pub in Redcar on May 28. She asked to borrow his phone, but he refused and tried to cycle away, Teesside Crown Court heard.
Syrett then "went down an alleyway and offered the victim sexual contact," said Shaun Dryden, prosecuting. "The victim refused, thinking it might be a ruse to steal from him."
Details of the attack
The group followed him and confronted him again outside Wetherspoons. Syrett pushed the man off his bike, "pushed her fingers into the man's eyes," and "produced a hypodermic needle and scratched the man with it," Mr Dryden told the court.
She stole the man's phone, bank card and £160 in cash. The victim later underwent HIV and Hepatitis B testing, the court heard.
Sentencing
Syrett admitted the robbery and breaching a suspended sentence at a previous hearing. Three weeks before the street robbery, she had left court with a suspended sentence for theft, assault and possession of a bladed article. She has other convictions for battery and assaulting emergency workers.
In mitigation, Cainan Lonsdale told the court the "confrontation was by chance, It wasn't a planned activity." Syrett had "given up" in the weeks and months before the robbery, her barrister said.
"She says at that point in her life she was walking the streets with no shoes on. She didn't care if she lived or died. She believes she was having a manic episode."
Judge's remarks
Judge Richard Clews told her the robbery was a "particularly unpleasant" incident. "I'm sure that you used, in a way, the presence of the other people to make it easier for you to get what you wanted from your hapless victim. He was knocked off his bicycle and you took his money. You scratched him with a hypodermic needle."
Looking at her criminal record, the judge added: "It doesn't look like you've ever learned the lesson that whatever your difficulties, being dishonest or violent is not the answer."
The judge activated four months of the previous eight-month suspended sentence. Syrett, of Hanson Street in Redcar, was jailed for a total of three years.
