UK NEWS

STUDENT IS FACING JAIL FOR URINATING ON WAR MEMORIAL

Laing urinated on a memorial similar to this one

Thursday November 5,2009

By Paul Jeeves

A DRINK-sodden university student who desecrated a poppy-laden war memorial by urinating on it during a pub crawl could face jail.

Philip Laing was taking part in the £10-a-head Carnage UK student event when he staggered up to the city centre monument.

Shamed Laing, 19, wore a poppy when he pleaded guilty at Sheffield Magistrates’ Court yesterday to outraging public decency.

He said he had no memory of his disgrace after drinking whisky and beer. Adjourning sentencing for reports, District Judge Anthony Browne warned Laing that prison was a serious option. The maximum term he could be given is six months.

The judge said: “The image of your urinating over the poppy wreath on the war memorial will make most turn away in disgust, shock and sadness.

“It has undoubtedly distressed and upset many.

“The war memorial is a sacred and a special place.”

He also criticised Warwickshire-based Varsity Leisure Group, the organisers of the Sheffield Carnage UK in which 2,000 students took part.

The judge said: “Carnage is the name of the organisation who promote this type of activity and some might say that somebody should be standing alongside you this morning.”

Rugby-playing former public schoolboy Laing, from Macclesfield, Cheshire, had been a student at Sheffield Hallam University for just three weeks on a sports technology degree course when he was seen at the memorial on October 11.

He is suspended from the university and will not learn until after he is sentenced on November 26 if he is to be thrown out.

Tim Hughes, for Laing, said he was from a decent family. His grandparents had fought in the Second World War.