A SHOPPER in Carlisle city centre angrily yelled at staff during a row over a receipt he had presented to get a refund for a pair of jeans.

Alfred Brown, 38, said he was annoyed with the staff in Topshop because they wrongly suggested the receipt he had presented to them was forged.

“I know 100 per cent that it wasn’t,” he told District Judge Gerald Chalk at the city’s Rickergate magistrates’ court.

Brown, of Mardale Road, Raffles, pleaded guilty to using threatening behaviour.

Pam Ward, prosecuting, said the defendant arrived at the city centre Topshop just after 12.30pm on March 12 and asked for the refund for jeans costing £39. He did not have the original receipt, but presented one that showed that the jeans had been exchanged in an earlier transaction when the purchaser paid an extra £4.

“Because of this, a staff member said he could only be repaid the £4 and the rest would have to be on a gift card,” said Miss Ward. “Mr Brown became angry, and started shouting and swearing at the staff.”

A staff member who had worked in the store for more than 16 years reported never before having felt so intimidated by a customer.

A community police officer also felt fearful at the defendant’s behaviour.

In court, Brown said he was initially arrested on suspicion of obtaining property by deception but that was not proceeded with. “Allegedly,” he said, “it was a forged receipt.

“But the person who gave it to me would not have had a forged receipt. I’ve never been in trouble in my life and neither have other members of my family, so yes, I admit I got angry.”

He said he recorded the entire incident on his mobile phone. He pleaded guilty to get the case out of the way, he said. District Judge Chalk fined Brown £45, with £85 costs, and a £30 victim surcharge, ordering that the defendant should pay at the minimum rate of £20 per month.