AN Evesham man cut off his electronic curfew tag because monitoring staff kept waking him up in the night.

Wesley Fisher told Premier Monitorings that the thickness of his duvet blocked the signal and he wanted to revoke his order.

Worcester magistrates heard that the 57-year-old man had even told a police officer what he was going to do.

"The curfew order and electronic tagging are designed to be an effective way of restricting liberty in a controlled manner to prevent them (the defendants) from committing further offences," said David Beech, prosecuting on behalf of Premier Monitorings.

"The requirements are explained to the defendants. From 7am until 7pm daily until Friday, June 28 he was to be indoors.

Wilful breach

"On April 8 we received a call saying he didn't want to be tagged any longer.

"The next day we received a call from Evesham police station. He had walked in saying he had cut the tag off. This is a wilful breach of the curfew order."

The court heard that Fisher, who was tagged following a driving while disqualified conviction, had been continually plagued by the equipment.

A black box is placed in the defendant's home where it receives a signal from the tag. But the court heard that Fisher, who lives in Blossomfield Close, Hampton, was continually contacted by Premier Monitorings after signals were lost.

"He's more than happy to comply with the electronic monitoring system," said Judith Kenney, defending.

"But he was having terrible problems with being woken up in the middle of the night.

"The monitoring service came to his house at midnight regularly.

"They started to phone him at 4, 5, 6 in the morning saying they had lost him.

"There are all sorts of reasons why it might go wrong but the excuse he's given is he's got too heavy a tog duvet.

"As a result the signal wasn't getting through. But, for his sins, he was getting disturbed.

"He didn't seem to be able to resolve the problem directly."

Fisher admitted the breach of his curfew. Magistrates revoked the order and imposed a 12-month conditional discharge for the original offence.