A MAN seen by drivers in the back of a moving van in Bowling claimed he was looking for ginger beer.

James McKenzie was caught as other motorists, including police on routine patrol, clocked him in the delivery vehicle throwing refuse bags filled with cigarettes on to the roadway.

The 48-year-old, who was listed in court papers as a prisoner of Low Moss, pleaded guilty last week to stealing the cigarettes, valued at more than £9,000.

On 28 June, a delivery van for United Wholesale in Polmadie, Glasgow, set out to make deliveries firstly in Balloch.

The van contained a large amount of food, alcohol and seven bin bags, each with seven boxes of cigarettes, and the vehicle was padlocked shut.

Around 10.20am, at the layby off the A82, the driver and his colleague stopped to consult their satnav and didn’t get out of the van.

They set out again around five minutes later and around 10.30am near Dunglass Roundabout and elsewhere, other drivers saw McKenzie in the back of the truck, throwing a number of black bin bags on to the roadway.

Police also observed the truck and also spotted McKenzie holding three bags in the rear. The put on their lights and siren and as the vehicle slowed down, McKenzie jumped out and tried to escape.

He was caught a short distance away and when asked what he was doing, he replied: “I was just trying to get a bottle of ginger beer and it drove off.”

Four of the bin bags with cigarettes were found to be missing and the total value lost was £9,118.37, heard Dumbarton Sheriff Court least week.

McKenzie, it emerged, had just 18 days left of an unexpired portion of a previous sentence for a similar conviction and would automatically be returned to jail for breaching his licence.

His defence agent said the Calton-raised McKenzie had been married for 29 years with two children but had not been in contact with them for some time given his criminal behaviour.

He has been addicted to cocaine and heroin from the late 1990s but had been doing well until the anniversary this year of discovering the body of his older brother in spring 2014.

The solicitor said: “He had been in the Dumbarton area and was looking to obtain drugs and was with another individual and acted in the way narrated.

“He doesn’t remember much but does accept responsibility. There was no gain for Mr McKenzie as a result of this.”

Sheriff Simon Pender, noting McKenzie’s “extremely bad record” sent him back to jail for the unexpired 18 days of his previous sentence plus an additional two years.