'I will cut you up': Serial offender stabbed shopping centre security guard in 'frenzied' attack

A 20-year-old who hit a shopkeeper over the head with a golf club and stabbed a shopping centre security guard has been sentenced to nearly five years in jail.

Luke McSharry, who had a long history of offending, took part in a ‘frenzied attack’ on Middleton Shopping Centre security guard, Paul McLaughlin, on August 14 last year. The week before McSharry had made threats to Mr McLaughlin saying he would “stab you up”.

On the 14th McSharry saw Mr McLaughlin again, becoming abusive and calling him a ‘fat c**t’ and again that he would ‘cut him up’. Mr McLaughlin took hold of him and there was a ‘scuffle’, according to prosecutor Hugh McKee at Manchester Minshull Street Court.

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“Within a short space of time he cut him five times”, Mr McKee added, before he ran away from the centre. McSharry was seen throwing something in a bush, which police later discovered to be the knife he had used in the attack.

McSharry, 19 at the time, was arrested on August 25 in Glossop, Derbyshire, where he was living in a tent in woodland. Officers also discovered a knife and an axe in the tent when he was arrested.

Mr McLaughlin suffered ‘multiple stab wounds’, the most serious being one to the forearm which sliced a tendon. However, none of the injuries were life threatening.

Another incident McSharry was charged with occurred on April 25 2020, when he was 18-years-old. A group of boys took a box of Carlsberg lager from a shop on Cross Lane, Radcliffe, with the shop owner chasing after them.

McSharry was spotted amongst the group by the owner. Later that evening the owner and a friend drove around the area looking for the group before