A sheriff has given a young offender who watched his girlfriend plunge to her death a chance to cut out a new life for himself.
Dominic Long was appearing for sentence at Wick Sheriff Court on Thursday for possession of a designer drug and a breach of an overnight house curfew.
Sentence had previously been repeatedly deferred after the court heard the 27-year-old was suffering from trauma in the wake of the tragedy in the summer of last year.
Long and 18-year-old girlfriend Alesha Wright had been walking along the seafront in his home town of Thurso in Caithness when they both ended up falling off 50 foot high cliffs.
The teenager died at the scene while Long was winched up and flown to hospital in Inverness with multiple injuries.
While his physical injuries have largely healed, the death of his girlfriend has taken a toll on his mental health.
Long has been diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder and has been referred to the community psychiatric nurse service.
Solicitor Fiona MacDonald described her client as “totally fragile” and said it would take him a long time to recover.
Miss MacDonald said: “His cliff fall and the loss of his girlfriend have been a wake-up call for him and he is trying to address getting his life back into some form of order.”
After reading an updated background report, Sheriff Ian Anderson said Long could not afford a fine and noted that he had been out of trouble for some time.
The sheriff admonished Long for the offences - unrelated to the tragedy - which he had previously admitted.
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