Armed police were called on a man tucking into a kebab after he pulled a gun from his waistband.
Paul Williams, a convicted drug dealer from Croxteth, was enjoying an early-morning takeaway when police and armed officers arrested him in Plymouth, Devon.
Williams, who was jailed for five years and three months in 2012 for conspiracy to supply heroin in Merseyside , had bought the air pistol from a homeless man in a street.
Plymouth Crown Court heard that panicked staff at the kebab shop reported two men on the premises at 3am, saying one had a gun.
However, Williams told the court that he was never going to use the airgun - except possibly to shoot vermin, reports Plymouth Live.
His barrister told a judge: “He accepts he was an idiot”.
Judge James Townsend handed him a suspended sentence with unpaid work.
He added: “An armed police unit had to be called and that creates a danger in its own right to everyone involved.
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“It is quite clear that you have worked hard to turn your life around. This was a moment of stupidity rather than anything more serious.”
Williams, of Newlyn Walk, pleaded guilty to possession of an air weapon in a public place on October 19 last year.
He also admitted possession of a firearm while prohibited after a prison sentence.
Katie Churcher, for the Crown Prosecution Service, said armed police responded and stopped the men in the area of Notte Street and Vauxhall Street.
She added that Williams immediately told them about the air pistol, which was seized by police.
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The barrister said the weapon’s gas canister was empty.
Miss Churcher added that Williams told police he had been in Plymouth working for an air conditioning company.
He said he had been out drinking with a colleague when a homeless person had approached offering to sell them an air pistol.
Williams said that he paid £15 for it, hoping to use it to shoot vermin.
Nigel Hall, for Williams, said that an expert report said the weapon had so little power it would struggle to penetrate a rat’s skin.
He added: “He is very sorry. He accepts that he was an idiot.”
Mr Hall said that Williams only got the pistol out in the kebab shop because it was uncomfortable in his waistband.
