Addiction to drugs can be extremely dangerous and drive anyone to make drastic life choices. In one such instance, a 49-year-old Englishman of Indian descent received a two-year prison term for harassing his parents for money to support his drug addiction. Despite being subject to restraining orders, he continued to do this.
Daevan Patel broke restraining orders that forbade him from contacting his parents in order to obtain money by emotionally blackmailing them. According to a Wolverhampton Crown Court article in “Birmingham Live,” Judge John Butterfield sentenced Daevan Patel to two years in prison and a five-year restraining order, saying that by “bleeding them for money,” he had made his parents’ lives a “misery.”
The judge told him this week, “you have contempt for others and for the orders of the courts.” According to testimony given in court, Daevan Patel “relentlessly” pursued financial gain and often contacted his parents ten times per day, visiting them if they did not respond.
He was given restraining orders to protect the parents, with the most recent one being granted in August 2019 for a period of five years and allowing only telephone contact. But, Daevan Patel was imprisoned for violating that.
According to the court report, the accused, who is also a convicted thief, would yell at his parents to comply with his demands. When they “ran out of money to give him,” they decided to call the police out of concern for what he might do.
The defence attorney for Daevan Patel said that drugs had destroyed his life and that he would no longer use drugs going forwards.
He is currently in prison at HMP Cardiff in Wales, where he has apparently decided to remain and avoid going back to the West Midlands, where there is a possibility he would associate with drug users.
In 2009 and 2013, restraining orders were granted against him to keep his parents safe.
When Patel went up to their Bilston, Wolverhampton, house, prosecutor Sarah Allen claimed he disobeyed the order three more times and “wore them down” until they paid over 28 pounds.
Prosecutor Allen in the court said, “He did not appear to show much care to the suffering he was causing his parents, and it appears he was of the view that because he was a drug addict, he was absolved of any responsibility for his actions.”
Patel’s parents made the decision to call the police after they “ran out of money to offer him”.
Patel, who is presently incarcerated in Cardiff, has a history of stealing, shoplifting, and dishonesty offences. On January 21, 25, and 27, he admitted to violating a restraining order on three separate charges.
