Threatened to kill neighbour who asked his guests to leave

The Magistrate’s Court heard that the neighbour, who lived in a flat in the same building as Zalitis, believed that there were several people in Zalitis’ room and the note said that everybody needed to leave.

This led to Zalitis coming out of his flat and hitting and kicking the other man’s door, shouting that he did not care about the coronavirus, and that the man had to come out of his flat sometime ‘and then I’ll have you’.

Zalitis, 29, of Room 6, The Warren, 13, Back Street, St Peter Port, admitted behaving in a disorderly manner.

The neighbour had been terrified during the incident, Crown advocate Chris Dunford told the court. He had called the police and when they arrived they found Zalitis in his room with one other man from the same building. Zalitis was very drunk and said that he was going to kill his neighbour.

During interview, he said he had meant nothing by the threat.

There was a previous bind-over still in place on Zalitis, from November 2018 for being found drunk in public.

For the defendant, Advocate Samuel Steel said that his client wished to apologise to the court and to his neighbour.

He had been upset since he had just taken up a new job at a restaurant, which had closed due to the coronavirus outbreak. He had one friend in his room that night.

When he received the note saying ‘everybody’ had to leave, he took it as an ultimatum to leave his own home.

Advocate Steel asked for the offence to be dealt with by way of a fine.

Judge Graeme McKerrell said he was not convinced by Zalitis’ apology.

The situation with his job did not excuse his behaviour and from what the judge had been told, the defendant’s employer had made the generous offer to keep his job open and provide him with some money during the virus crisis, which was enough to pay the rent and buy essentials.

His neighbour had been right to contact the police and was to be congratulated.

‘It’s said that you said to your neighbour that you didn’t care about the Covid-19 virus. If that is true and it wasn’t just something said in drink, then quite frankly you are an idiot,’ said the judge.

‘I am struggling to accept that you do understand the seriousness of, not only your situation, but also the danger your idiotic comments pose, because if it is what you believe then you pose a real risk to society.’

He fined Zalitis £1,200 for disorderly behaviour and a further £200 for breaching the bind-over.