Sheriff views on legal highs

Pushers 'despicable' says sheriff
A SHERIFF has criticised people who take "unpredictable" legal highs in the Caithness community and the "despicable" pushers.
Sheriff Andrew Berry expressed the hope that society would catch up with the sellers of the drug, "the sooner the better".
The sheriff was speaking at Wick today, prior to sentencing a teenager on charges of causing damage at his home in Wick on October 15, resisting the police and assaulting one of them.
The 16-year-old accused, who cannot be named for legal reasons, pleaded guilty and was said to have taken legal highs.
Sheriff Berry said that a number of young people in the local community had died because they had taken substances, the consequences of which "they had not the faintest idea about".
The sheriff went on: "Some of these deaths, I understand, are attributable to the use or misuse of legal highs. Hopefully, some day people will come to realise that the use of these drugs is completely unpredictable."
Sheriff Berry described the pushers as "truly despicable people" going about selling the legal highs which "have a direct consequence on young lives".
The 16-year-old was said to have repeatedly struck a bedroom wall at his home punching holes in it. When resisting the police he kicked Constable Christopher Mackenzie. The court heard that he was taking steps to address difficulties in his life while on a community pay back order imposed previously.
Sheriff Berry, who described the teenager's behaviour on October 15 as "outrageous" ordered that he be put under supervision for six months with a review in a month and warned him that any lack of co-operation or re-offending would likely attract a custodial sentence.