Men jailed for toilet robbery

Press, 19 December 1981, Page 4

Men jailed for toilet robbery

Two men, who beat up a married man in a city toilet because they thought he was a homosexual, were . jailed, for nine months by Mr Justice Roper in the High Court yesterday. Gary William McQuillan, aged 26, and Stephen Barry Gordon, aged 23. a barman, had been found guilty by a jury on a charge of robbing ' Murray James Ward of $2l and clothing. Evidence was given at the trial that Mr Ward had staggered from the Manchester Street car park toilet battered and bleeding and without pants and underpants after he had been beaten up by McQuillan and Gordon. "It may be that this was a matter which got out of hand. It started as the baiting of a person whom you thought was a homosexual and it has been suggested on your befalf, Gordon, that this

was simply a few moments of idiocy," His Honour said. “Well, unfortunately, this form of idiocy is all too common. So common that regrettably it is beginning to be taken as normal.” His Honour said that he accepted that Gordon’s previous offending had been quite minor and that this was ' really an inexplicable fall from grace. McQuillan was already Serving a term of imprisonment and was due for release early in the New Year. He had an appalling list of convictions at first sight but when the matrimonial and driving offences were removed it was not so bad. He did not. propose to distinguish between the two of them. Mr G. E. Langham appeared for McQuillan, and Mr M. J. Knowles for Gordon.