PRESS ASSOCIATION -- An 11-year-old has been given an 18-month youth rehabilitation order for stealing a bin during the recent riots.
The boy from Romford in Essex, who cannot be named for legal reasons, is the youngest rioter in London to face prosecution, according to Scotland Yard.
He committed the offence just five days after being given a referral order for arson, criminal damage and carrying a pointed instrument in an unrelated incident.
The youngster took the waste bin, which was worth £50, from Debenhams in Romford on August 8. A group of "males" had smashed the windows of the store, causing £6,000 worth of damage, and a policeman spotted the boy reaching in to take a bin that was on display.
The boy, who had previously admitted burglary, was sentenced at Havering Magistrates' Court in Essex by District Judge John Woollard, who said: "You seem to think that nobody can stop the way you behave."
The youngster was placed under an 18-month youth rehabilitation order, and told that his local authority will dictate where he lives for the next six months.
He was already under a referral order, put in place at the same court on August 3, for an incident on July 18 when he cut the seats of a bus with a knife and tried to set fire to the exposed foam. When the driver would not let him off, the 11-year-old threw a stone at the exit door and kicked a hole in the shattered glass so he could jump out while the bus was still moving.
The district judge told the boy, who sat in court next to his mother:"My view is that the offence is a very serious one. If you were a little older you would be ending up in prison, you would be looked after there rather than elsewhere. You need to understand very clearly that you can't get away with committing offences of this nature."
After the sentencing, children's charity Barnardo's criticised the courts for punishing children of this age for "minor offences".
Chief executive Anne Marie Carrie said: "It is both counter-productive and costly to hand out disproportionately punitive sentences for minor offences such as petty theft, particularly to younger children of 10 or 11. The evidence shows that after a year, half of boys and girls at this age who are sentenced in court will have reoffended and their experience within the criminal justice system increases the likelihood that they will go on to commit further crimes."