Man fined after threatening Kate Forbes’ Dingwall SNP office with AK47s

Staff at Badenoch MSP Kate Forbes’ office were terrified when an angry voter threatened to use AK47s, claiming he had connections in Ireland.

The alarming incident happened on March 24, 2024 in the SNP constituency office in Dingwall after 56-year-old Iain McIntosh of Glenisla, Foyers had phoned the premises wishing to bring in documents for their attention.

Fiscal depute Martina Eastwood told Inverness Sheriff Court that McIntosh handed over a letter of complaint about some court proceedings and "as he was preparing to leave, his language changed to being aggressive.

"He said he had connections in Ireland, had access to guns and mentioned AK47s. He left the office and CCTV led to his identification." the prosecutor added.

McIntosh admitted threatening behaviour and threatening to use firearms on others.

His lawyer, Graham Mann, told Sheriff Gary Aitken that his client was very emotional when he first appeared and was again at court.

"He was engaged in conversation with staff where he was describing the difficulties he was having with other people. He wishes he hadn't used that language. It was pretty alarming."

Sheriff Aitken agreed and referred to the murders of Labour MP Jo Cox who was shot and stabbed in 2016 and Sir David Amiss who was stabbed to death in 2021`.

He said: "There are people who shoot MPs dead in constituency offices as there are people after 9/11 who thought they were being funny when they said they had a bomb in their bags before getting on a plane.

"This was exceedingly ill-advised language he used that day."

Mr Mann added: "He has no connections to Ireland or AK47s."

Sheriff Aitken responded: "They were not to know that. In his background report, as he puts it, he was letting off steam but made the situation worse."

He told McIntosh: "Whatever you may have thought or felt, it must have been concerning for those involved.

"You may think you were being funny or flippant, so be careful in future with what you say."

McIntosh was fined £840.