An asylum seeker has skipped his own sentencing after threatening a man near a migrant hotel to eat fish and chips.
Shkar Jamal was due to be sentenced for threatening another man with a snooker cue while he was staying at a hotel in Bournemouth, Dorset.
His hearing at Poole Magistrates’ Court was supposed to take place at 12.30pm.
However, when the case was called by the court usher, he was nowhere to be found in the court's public waiting room or outside the building.
A search party, which included Jamal's own defence barrister, was launched for the 24-year-old.
Around 15 minutes later, the defendant was spotted sitting on a bench nearby, eating fish and chips.
The takeaway was apparently bought from the nearby Parkway Fish Bar, around a five minute walk away from the court building.
By the time Jamal got back to the building, another case had been called on and then the magistrates broke for lunch.
A search party was launched from Poole Magistrates' Court
| GoogleAn interpreter who speaks Kurdish Sorani, the language spoken in Iraq and Kurdistan, had been booked for the hearing.
Due to a backlog of cases, the afternoon schedule was too full to hear his case, which was adjourned at 4.30pm.
He was allowed to leave court on bail and his case was adjourned until October 24.
Jamal is currently being housed at a hotel that has been converted into migrant accommodation.
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Jamal admitted threatening a victim with a snooker cue, on Old Christchurch Road, Bournemouth
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At a previous hearing, Jamal admitted threatening a victim with an offensive weapon, namely a snooker cue, in a public place on Old Christchurch Road, Bournemouth on May 6.
The justice system in England is currently facing a massive pile-up of cases, as a Crown Court judge hit out at the "chronic" backlog in the system.
The crown court backlog stood at a record 76,957 cases as of March 31 2025, up 11 per cent from 69,021 a year earlier, according to the latest Ministry of Justice figures.
Some 18,093 cases had been open for at least a year at the end of March, also a record high.
Judge Anthony Lowe said "it is not a proper justice system where people are having to wait that length of time for their trial", as he adjourned the case into TV presenter Jay Blades whose rape case was pushed back to September 2027.
Speaking at Shrewsbury Crown Court, Judge Lowe said: "I am sorry to say that that will not take place for effectively over two years, until the 20th of September 2027.
“I regret that. Not as much as you do but I do regret it. It is not a proper justice system where people are having to wait that length of time for their trial but I am afraid there is just nothing I can do.
"That, I am afraid, is just the state of where we are with outstanding trials."
Blades’s defence counsel Susan Meek told the court the defendant had been unable to work since the rape allegations were made, adding: "It is an extraordinarily long time for him not to be able to work."
Judge Lowe said he was unable to "bump" other cases out of the list to accommodate an earlier trial.
He said: "I understand the application you make, Ms Meek.
"But the reality is, perhaps with the press’s attention on this case, it will at least bring it more to the public domain, the chronic position we are in, in relation to the backlog."