A RECOVERING alcoholic stole a bottle of wine after being evacuated from a shop during a fire alert.
Lesley Susan Coulson, 42, picked up a £2.19 bottle of Lambrini from a shelf at the Home Bargains store in Hartlepool's Middleton Grange Shopping Centre, shortly before the centre fire alarm went off.
Coulson was still in possession of the booze wh
en she was ushered out of the store with other shoppers. She never returned to offer payment.
Prosecutor Lynne Dalton said: "The defendant was in the store selecting a bottle of Lambrini when the fire alarm went off.
"She was captured on CCTV leaving the store without offering payment.
"In police interview she accepted taking the item knowing she shouldn't have done."
The court heard Coulson, of Tankerville Street, Hartlepool, has nothing on her criminal record since 2005. She admitted theft on October 16.
Alison Banks, mitigating, said: "My client is a recovering alcoholic. Her clear intention was to pay. She went to the till and was in the queue to make payment.
"When the fire alarms went off, she was ushered out of the store. When she left the store, she then decided she needed to have the drink.
"She could have had the opportunity to go back in. She does accept she should have gone back."
Mrs Banks said Coulson had received detox treatment since the offence and had hardly drank for three years.
District Judge Martin Walker gave Coulson a six-month conditional discharge.
