A drunk bomb hoaxer who claimed to be an Irish terrorist and to have planted devices throughout Brighton has been ordered into rehab.
Mark Wilkinson, 46, admitted calling police on July 4 and telling him he was from the UDA, a Northern Irish paramilitary group when he appeared at Brighton Magistrates Court later that month.
He has now been sentenced to 12 days of rehabilitation, £90 victim surcharge and £85 costs after returning to court on August 27 for sentencing.
The earlier hearing was told that police had been able to quickly trace the call and discovered it was made using a mobile phone number belonging to Wilkinson, who has previous convictions for communication network offence in 2011 and wasting police time in 2014.
They went to arrest him at the hostel he was staying at in Oriental Place, Brighton, where they found him drunk and unable to remember placing the call.
At the July hearing, prosecutor Martina Sherlock said: “The police received a phonecall from a person who said they were a member of the UDA and that various devices had been placed throughout Brighton and he was going to have some fun and said it was a coded message.
“Police traced the number that had been used to call from and found it was a number associated with Mark Wilkinson.
“At custody, he was interviewed and fully admitted the offence. He was drunk and didn’t know what he had done. He thought a friend had spiked his drink.
“He said he was sorry for his actions, he didn’t want to bomb Brighton or cause anyone any harm.”
Wilkinson has a total of ten previous convictions for 12 offences.
Court records show that the 2014 offence for wasting police time related to a call in which he falsely claimed to have firearms on him.
