A young farmer was facing jail today after a jury found him guilty of ramming a forklift into a former school friend’s van and then slashing his neck with a blade.
Stuart Allan’s victim was left so terrified by the assault on farmland in Alford that he fabricated a story to explain his injuries to family and friends.
Aberdeen Sheriff Court heard Allan, 31, acted like a “drug-crazed hitman” when he ploughed the forklift’s spikes through the windscreen of Gary Stuart’s van before cutting his throat.
It took the jury an hour to reach their verdict
Farmer told jury of ordeal
Mr Stuart said Allan was driving a grey Manitou low loader laden with bales when he met his own VW Caddy van on the road near their neighbouring family farms on November 23, 2019.
He said the pair then fought in the road before Allan landed a “big smack” which left him “stunned”, then swung a knife twice making contact with his neck.
He said Allan told him: “You are lucky I stopped there, I was going to slit your throat, pick up your vehicle and dump it in the River Don.
“If you tell anybody about this I will come after you and come after your family.”
Made up tale for friends and family
Mr Stuart admitted he lied to family and friends about what happened for the next two months because he was “terrified” Allan would come after him.
Medical records detailing Mr Stuart’s trips to hospital in Huntly and Aberdeen Royal Infirmary following the incident showed he told medics he had injured himself on an angle grinder.
He was treated for two lacerations to his neck with stitches and has been left permanently scarred, though the Crown later agreed his injuries were not life-threatening.
The mechanic and farmer also tried to explain the damage to the windscreen by claiming a bucket had fallen onto his van.
He was ‘scared looking’ and ‘twitchy’
His uncle Ian Stuart told the court his nephew “wasn’t himself” in the weeks after the attack and was instead “scared-looking” and “twitchy”.
His daughter Julie-Anne Stuart also gave evidence and said her cousin had started acting “odd” about a week after the incident and stopped coming by his uncle’s Alford home.
She told the court: “Gary became edgy. I asked to see his neck and he wouldn’t let me see. Normally he’d come by my dad’s house and be there for hours, but he was weird.
“He was not like Gary at all.”
His uncle, Ian Stuart, 67, also claimed he had felt threatened after running into Allan on two occasions after his nephew had reported the matter to the police and that Allan made “throat-slitting” and insulting finger gestures at him.
Firestarter gave evidence
A key witness for the prosecution was recently-convicted firestarter and Huntly farmer Ryan Milne, who told the court that Allan had admitted his guilt to him when the pair were in the Oak Pub in Huntly over Hogmanay.
The 23-year-old said: “Stuart wasn’t really boastful about what happened with Gary but seemed happy to tell folk.”
He said Allan told him he’d struck Mr Stuart’s neck with a key held between his knuckles.
Mr Milne said he didn’t go to the police because it was none of his business.
Allan gives evidence
On the final day of the trial, Allan gave evidence himself and repeatedly denied the charges against him, claiming he was “not that kind of guy”.
“I’m just a working stockman who likes an easy life,” he said.
But the jury, of eight men and seven women, found Allan, of Goryhill Farm, Alford, unanimously guilty of assaulting Mr Stuart to his injury and permanent disfigurement and danger of life.
He was also found guilty by a majority of behaving in a threatening or abusive manner towards him and guilty by a unanimous verdict of making threatening gestures to Ian Stuart.
Sheriff Morag McLaughlin allowed Allan’s bail to continue after hearing he was vital to the feeding of the farm animals.
She deferred sentence until next month, but warned him: “This is a serious charge so at the forefront of my mind is a custodial sentence.”
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