Goalkeeper allowed out to play

6:08pm Wednesday 27th August 2008

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A JUDGE has allowed a goalkeeper to stay out late on a curfew so he can train with the rest of his team.

Tom Berryman, 21, of Ashton Street, Trowbridge, who plays for Wiltshire League side Bromham, appeared at Swindon Crown Court on Wednesday after failing on the supervision element of a suspended sentence imposed for burgling his former employer.

Rather than activate a nine-month jail term, Judge Douglas Field told him he was going to order him to remain inside from 8pm to 6am for two months.

But after hearing the former drug addict trained on Tuesday and Thursday evenings he allowed him to stay out until 10pm on those nights.

"My view is it is a good thing you have an interest such as football so I am going to accommodate you," he said.

Berryman had been working as a chef at the Old Manor Hotel in Trowle Common in 2006 and had left when the break-in took place in December that year.

As well as taking a set of knives he also stole a Rolex watch from the private quarters of the establishment.

Nicola McIntosh, prosecuting, said after the suspended sentence order was made in April last year Berryman missed appointments in June and August, and failed to turn up for the preparation of a recent pre-sentence report.

David Chidgey, defending, said his client had been involved in drugs at the time of the offence.

Although he had not completed the supervision order the sentence had kept him out of trouble. He said the order went wrong because he failed to keep the probation service informed of where he was living.

The judge revoked the old order and replaced it with a two-month curfew.