A TROUBLED man has been jailed for five years after he pointed a gun at his parents and fired a shot in their home.

Brian John Capstick, 49, appeared before Carlisle Crown Court for sentencing after admitting two counts of illegal possession of a firearm at an earlier hearing.

Gerard Rogerson, prosecuting, told the court Capstick had gone to visit two friends at about 8pm on December 13 last year.

Aware of his history of bipolar, Mr Rogerson read out their account of the visit: “They were shocked at seeing him so well and said he was back to being ‘good old Brian’.”

He left the home at about 10pm and about half an hour later he arrived at the Bootle home of his parents James and Susan Capstick. Capstick knocked at the door and was greeted by his mother.

“Susan went to hug her son but he batted her away and said: ‘No, no’,” said Mr Rogerson. “She felt like he was on a mission.”

The Mail:

The prosecutor described how Capstick, previously of Newfield House in Ecclefechan, had been complaining a Christmas card had been addressed only to him. He also brought up a previous debt his father had with him as the arguments continued.

“All three moved into the living room and Mr Capstick placed his rucksack on the floor and said: ‘I think you better sit down’,” outlined Mr Rogerson. As his parents sat he pulled out a Enfield revolver.

“You know what it is, it is a Second World War pistol and it has five caps in it,” he said.

He then fired the gun into a bookcase in an adjacent room.

The Mail:

A police manhunt ensued and he was found the next day in the woods in Broughton where he had buried the Enfield revolver and a second gun - a double-barrelled derringer pistol. When he was found by police, he told officers where he had hidden the guns.

Brendan Burke, defending, said his client had stumbled across the pistols during a renovation of his home and that they had not been purchased illegally.

Capstick’s mental health was the subject of assessments by a number of psychiatrists after he suffered an “acute depressive episode” at the time of the offences. He was subsequently ruled as mentally fit to be sentenced. Judge Nicholas Barker disagreed with the defence he should deviate from the minimum five year sentence for this offence, saying the circumstances were not suitable.