By Staff Reporter

Last updated 11:40, Tuesday, 13 May 2008

AN ALCOHOLIC has been ordered to stop drinking in public by a court after being persistently found drunk in his home town.

Malcolm Raymond Kennedy, 47, of Queen Street, Whitehaven, was handed a two-year anti-social behaviour order by magistrates, forbidding him to drink in public, after being taken to court. He had been seen shouting in the road, asleep in a doorway, refusing to leave a takeaway shop, lying near to cars by a supermarket and smashing an empty vodka bottle on a road.

All the incidents occurred when he was drunk.

Charles Bland, prosecuting at Whitehaven Magistrates’ Court, said Kennedy’s “persistent drunken behaviour during the day and in front of passers-by’’ meant he should be considered for an anti-social behaviour order.

Mr Bland said the Asbo – which bans Kennedy from possessing alcohol outdoors in public and from being drunk in public in a designated area – would hopefully avoid any more episodes.

Neil Pilling, for Kennedy, called his client’s alcoholism “an illness’’ which he was successfully overcoming through medication and the support of his sister and brother-in-law.

He said that his client now had his own address for the first time in three years, after previously living rough.

“He has drastically cut back on his drinking,’’ added Mr Pilling.