A MAN who punched a Balloch shopworker and was found with a knife has been returned to prison to finish his sentence.

Jay Dee McLachlan, 27, had been jailed a year ago for 16 months with an additional eight months of supervised release.

At Dumbarton Sheriff Court on January 3, 2019, McLachlan admitted he breached that order.

McLachlan behaved in a threatening or abusive manner in the Co-op store in Carrochan Road, Balloch, on September 17, 2017. He threw a bottle of alcohol to the ground, smashing it, assaulted the male employee by punching him onn the body, and was caught with a lock back knife when police arrested him.

At court this week, defence lawyer Ian Moir told Sheriff Maxwell Hendry: "He appears here today on a breach of his supervised release order. He accepts the breach fully and is aware how it is likely to be dealt with.

"He was released back into the community homeless and unable to take steps towards rehabilitation and to engage properly with the order."

Sheriff Hendry told McLachlan, whose address was given as a prisoner of Low Moss, that there was "no alternative" but to send him back to jail to complete the sentence.

He restricted the jail term to six months.