A JUDGE will decide later this month whether a man intentionally removed a court-imposed night-time curfew tag from his ankle, as is alleged.

Ralph Brook, 47, was handed a suspended prison sentence at Carlisle Crown Court in late July for a raft of crimes which occurred on several different dates around the turn of this year.

Brook committed four shoplifting crimes; coughed “violently and deliberately” into the face of a police officer at his home in Brough before being arrested during the COVID-19 lockdown in early May; and also twice drove despite being banned from getting behind the wheel a vehicle.

Those put him in breach of a previously imposed crown court sentence for making a cruel bid to scam a vulnerable Kendal householder.

However, Brook, was spared prison after a judge concluded it would be “unjust” to activate that sentence.

Part of Brook’s July punishment included him being fitted with an electronic curfew tag to keep him indoors at night for a period of four months.

But he has been brought back to court for allegedly breaching the suspended sentence. He is accused of removing the tag from his ankle on August 5 - but denies any such breach.

A judge will now rule on what exactly happened - and whether or not Brook breached the crown court sentence - after listening prosecution and defence evidence.

This will take place at a hearing scheduled for October 16.

Until then Brook was granted unconditional bail.