8:18am Friday 3rd July 2009
By John Hoskins
ARMED police swooped on a busy Southampton shopping street after reports that a man was brandishing a handgun, a court heard.
Officers wearing bulletproof vests arrested Zachary Lowe as he emerged from a betting shop in Shirley High Street.
They forced him to lie face down on the ground, handcuffed and searched him, finding a plastic toy gun. Lowe claimed it had been a joke and he had intended giving it to a friend. But Southampton Crown Court was told that Lowe had produced the gun from a pocket in front of a driver who had just parked his car.
Lowe had walked past the car, stopped a couple of feet away and pulled the gun from his left pocket. Driver Michael Budd told jurors: “He shook it about waist height by his side. There was no conversation. He stood there for about a couple of seconds and then put the handgun back into his pocket.”
Mr Budd said Lowe did not make any threat but it made him feel “anxious”.
He phoned the police and armed officers swooped to arrest Lowe as he left Ladbrokes. Lowe accused Mr Budd of waving to him to pass behind his car as he crossed the road but then reversed sharply.
He claimed he had pointed his finger at him and Mr Budd had laughed.
Lowe told the court: “I don't know what came over me.
“Without thinking I took out the gun out of my pocket, swung it horizontally and then put it away. It was never my intention to make him think I was going to use it or do any violence. It was a joke.”
Lowe, of Waterloo Road, Southampton, admitted possessing an imitation firearm in a public place and was bailed for sentence on July 24. He denied possessing the firearm with intent to cause fear of violence and was acquitted within 15 minutes.
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