Magic mushroom man goes on wild rampage smashing up nine cars

An out-of-control hoodlum who was high on magic mushrooms and cannabis went berserk smashing up nine parked cars near his home.

Jameel Chenia, 30, also threw a brick at three officers, which bounced off a constable’s stab vest.

He then retrieved the brick as he violently resisted arrest and used it to hit an officer, who was left with a cut on his head Leicester Crown Court was told.

READ MORE: Catch up on the latest court news on LeicestershireLive

Chenia, of St Clements Court, Comet Close, Newfound Pool, admitted nine counts of causing damage to vehicles, three common assaults on police emergency workers and causing actual bodily harm to a fourth officer.

He also admitted possessing cannabis, a class B drug and magic mushrooms, a hallucinogenic class A drug and using violence to force his way into a neighbour’s flat during the mayhem in the early hours of Sunday January 31.

Lynsey Knott, prosecuting, said residents in Comet Close and Fosse Lane heard a commotion outside, including “banging and screaming” at about 4am.

One witness saw the defendant using a brick to smash a car windscreen and went outside to confront him.

Chenia claimed he was locked out of his own car and the resident started to head back inside, but the defendant followed and tried to force his way into the flat.

The resident and his wife were left trying frantically to close the door as the defendant was forcefully pushing and shoulder-barging against it, before he left and started wrecking more vehicles, damaging wing mirrors, windscreen wipers, bodywork and smashing windscreens and car windows.

The damage to six of the vehicles cost £1,600 to fix and the repair bill for the three other cars was unknown, said the prosecutor.

Police were called to the scene and followed “a trail of blood” to the defendant’s flat.

Chenia was not there, but officers found a smashed mobile phone and two jars, containing magic mushrooms and cannabis.

Miss Knott said: “While officers were there the defendant used a brick to smash a window of his own flat from outside and climbed through it.

“He threw a brick towards three officers in a corridor, narrowly missing two but bouncing off the other’s stab vest, that did not cause injury.”

The defendant ended up on the floor kicking out and lunged for a brick on the floor, before swinging it onto a constable’s head, causing a three centimetre cut that required gluing at hospital.

Incapacitant spray was used before he was arrested, but had little effect.

Chenia later told police he had taken magic mushrooms, which resulted in him hearing voices telling him to smash up his phone and feeling as if he was having a heart attack.

Miss Knott said: “He said he couldn’t recall causing the damage or encountering the officers because of his mental state.

“He said he wasn’t the sort of person who would do such a thing.”

One of the female officers present later described the incident, in a statement read out, as “frightening and intense” and although she expected volatile situations in her job added: “This was extreme.”

She suffered a stiff arm and bruising afterwards and stated: “I love my job, I’ve worked hard to become an officer and this incident has knocked my confidence.”

James Varley, mitigating, said the defendant had sought help for his mental health, and was referred for treatment a few days before the incident, when he was documented as suffering from “mania, anxiety and low mood.”

He said Chenia accepted he behaved in a “wholly irrational and bizarre manner” on the night in question, that included trying to get into someone else’s flat that he thought was his own, before the situation escalated.

Mr Varley said Chenia’s actions were “completely and utterly out of character” due to his poor mental health and that his client was not a jobless yob, but had full-time employment at a local well known factory and lived with his partner.

He added: “He’s got a supportive family who are at court today and are anxious to help him get some kind of assistance.

“He has no recollection of what he did when under the influence of hallucinogenic drugs and what he was doing was far more dangerous than the hippies of the 1970’s and 1980’s.

“The drugs he took to make himself feel better were actually making him worse.”

The barrister said that Chenia’s father died in terrible circumstances, when the defendant was 15, that he was still deeply affected by.

Sentencing, Judge Keith Raynor said: “Your behaviour was utterly disgraceful.

“The police were rightly scared during this incident and their incapacitant spray had no effect.”

Chenia was jailed for a total of 19 months.

Leicestershire Live – Leicester News