Teacher who fired air pistol is freed

A teacher jailed for firing an air pistol during a confrontation with a gang of youths she claimed had vandalised her home was freed by the Court of Appeal today.

A teacher jailed for firing an air pistol during a confrontation with a gang of youths she claimed had vandalised her home was freed by the Court of Appeal today.

Special needs teacher Linda Walker, 48, fired at the pavement during a stand-off with a group she described as a gang of "yobs" outside her home last August.

Three appeal judges set aside her six months prison sentence and granted a conditional discharge, but refused her permission to challenge her convictions of affray and possessing a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence.

Walker sat in the court dock and smiled at her family at the back of the courtroom as Lord Justice Rose, Mr Justice Gibbs and Mr Justice Stanley Burnton announced their decision.

She had told police she had received nuisance phone calls abusing her family, her garden shed had been broken into, and a car and her garden had been vandalised.

But no evidence was produced at the trial that any of the youths she confronted was involved in the vandalism.

Walker, from Urmston, Greater Manchester, was was jailed at Manchester Crown Court on March 29.

In her bid to challenge her conviction, she sought leave to call fresh evidence from a milkman, David Matthews, that one of the youths had been seen on her property.

But the judges said the evidence went only to credit and did not relate to what happened on the day of the confrontation.