DOOR staff at a Carlisle bar were subjected to racial abuse by an angry man who brandished a broken bottle - and then threatened to return with a bomb.
The workers on the receiving of Ali Omar Ali’s threats – which included repeated comments that he planned to kill them – were so alarmed by his aggressive behaviour that they contacted the police.
At the city’s Rickergate court, Ali, 21, of London Road, Carlisle, admitted using a broken bottle to threaten a person and a second charge of using threatening behaviour in a way that was racially aggravated.
Prosecutor Pam Ward said the defendant first came to the attention of security staff at 4.30am on June 19 when he tried to get into Truth Bar, at Englishgate Place, just off Botchergate.
“Initially, his entry was denied,” said Mrs Ward. “But he made his way into the club anyway.” The security staff decided that Ali should be asked to leave because he had become argumentative with the staff.
“He had been making unwanted advances to young ladies in the club,” continued the prosecutor. As he was leaving the club, however, Ali began directing racist remarks towards the security staff, criticising English people.
As well as yelling racial insults at the staff, he tried to get into an argument with a young woman. At one point, he was heard to say: “I’m going to come back and bomb this place and kill you all.”
At 5.30am, Ali returned to the club and began kicking the window in an apparent attempt to damage it. He then picked up a bottle, smashed it, and began brandishing it and pointing it at the watching security staff nearby.
Again, he made a threat to kill them. Ali was arrested on Botchergate as he was walking away from the area.
One of the security workers later told police that the defendant’s comments had upset him. “You never know what people are capable of in this job,” he said, explaining that what happened had played on his mind.
He said: “I am fairly robust but this male got to me. We even stayed behind as door staff to see everybody out. This was in case something happened. At about 5.10am, the same male returned and tried to kick and damage the windows.”
This was when Ali brandished the broken bottle and made the second threat to kill people. “He shouted it and I was scared,” said the security worker, adding that he then saw Ali walk towards the door staff, and this made him even more terrified.
He feared Ali would act on his threat, he added.
“I immediately rang the police as we couldn’t dealt with this.”
A probation worker who interviewed Ali, who has no previous convictions, said while he had expressed remorse, he seemed unable to identify the potential consequences of his actions on the day in question.
“He insists that he no longer uses alcohol,” added the probation officer.
Presiding magistrate Paul Baird said of the threat with the broken bottle: “What makes this offence worse is that it was committed against somebody who was serving the public and there was alcohol involved.”
Ali was jailed for four months. When released, he will have to pay £85 costs, and a £154 victim surcharge.
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