A judge decried the scourge of shoplifting in York as he jailed a notorious thief who brazenly plundered hundreds of pounds’ worth of goods from a Co-op store then beat a woman “to a pulp” in Shambles Market days later.
Callum Ellerby, 27, went into the Co-op in Clarence Street, near Wigginton Road, and was “stuffing” laundry items into his basket when a shop worker confronted him, York Crown Court heard.
When the male staff member asked him to stop, Ellerby walked up to him and said: “Fxxx off, I’ll knock you out.”
Prosecutor Kelly Clarke said the staff member thought he was going to be assaulted and backed off.
Ellerby, a burly figure, then returned to the shelves and shamelessly stole more items before walking out of the shop with over £245 of goods, York Crown Court heard.
Six days after the shoplifting incident on September 24 last year, Ellerby – together with his own mother, 45-year-old Anne Ellerby – beat up a woman under a stall canopy at Shambles Market, just off Parliament Street.
Ms Clarke showed the court CCTV footage of a group of people including Callum Ellerby arriving in the market area on bikes and converging on the lone woman.
His mother asked the woman for a pound, and then Callum Ellerby said: “Where’s your money?”
When she said she didn’t have any, Anne Ellerby punched her in the eye with a “heavy” blow, knocking her to the ground. Callum Ellerby then kicked her in the back.
The victim had “blood all over her” and suffered a “severely” blackened eye. Police later found “blood seeping into the pavement”.
A police dog later found Callum Ellerby hiding in bushes near Hull Road at about 3am. On being found, he told officers: “Can the other cases get dropped now then?”
Police put out a public appeal for information about the whereabouts of his mother, but knowing she was wanted, she later handed herself in at Fulford Road Police Station.
Admitted offences
Callum and Anne Ellerby were each charged initially with the attempted robbery of the woman in the market area, next to the Pret a Manger café.
They denied the allegation, but each belatedly admitted assaulting the woman, causing actual bodily harm. The prosecution ultimately accepted these pleas.
Callum Ellerby, from York but currently of no fixed address, also admitted shop theft and threatening behaviour in relation to the incident at the Co-op.
They appeared for sentence yesterday (Tuesday), Callum Ellerby from a prison-to-court video link after being remanded in custody.
Ms Clarke said that on the night before the attack, Anne Ellerby, the assault victim and others had been smoking crack cocaine at a flat in York.
Some of the crack appeared to be missing and one of the group “jokingly” accused the victim of taking it.
The following day, the victim was in York city centre, near the market, when a group of people, including Anne and Callum Ellerby, surrounded her and the mother and son attacked her.
Ms Clarke said the attack had had a profound psychological effect on the victim who was now afraid to leave her house and was on medication for depression.
She said that Anne Ellerby, of Third Avenue, York, had 40 previous offences on her record, mainly thefts.
Callum Ellerby had 36 previous offences including battery, burglary, damaging property, theft from vehicles and shoplifting, mainly at Co-op stores in the city.
Defence barrister Erin Kitson-Parker, for Anne Ellerby, said her client had tried to stop the violence at one stage of the attack in the market.
She said that Ellerby was now free of drugs and alcohol following rehabilitation and was now living with her parents.
Lily Wildman, for Callum Ellerby, said that her client had been “drinking quite heavily at the time of the incident” and that alcohol was at the root of his offending.
‘Blighted by thievery’
Judge Simon Hickey told Callum Ellerby: “The Co-op stores in this city are blighted by your thievery.
“In this case it was Clarence Street – a brazen theft of a significant amount of property that was never recovered.”
He said that residents and shopkeepers alike were “sick” of such endemic thievery and it was the shops which had to “pay the price” through higher insurance premiums.
“Shop theft is a blight on the city and many others,” added Mr Hickey.
He said that the female assault victim had been given a “severe beating” and the psychological effect had been so profound that it had effectively “ruined” her life.
Callum Ellerby was jailed for two-and-a-half years for the attack and received two months consecutive for the shoplifting incident.
However, he was told he would serve less than half that time behind bars before being released on prison licence, less the time he had spent on remand.
The judge said he could suspend the inevitable jail sentence in Anne Ellerby’s case because she had finally kicked her drink-and-drug habit, she had been doing well on an existing community order from a previous offence and now had stable accommodation.
Anne Ellerby’s 20-month prison sentence was suspended for 18 months. As part of that order, she will have to complete a six-month drug-treatment programme and 20 days’ rehabilitation activity.
