THE Cleethorpes fraudster who was shown on national TV being "arrested" by a man dressed as Batman has appeared in court.
Footage of drug addict Daniel Frayne being collared by the Batman character became a TV hit after being shown on national news programmes and on YouTube.
He appeared before Grimsby magistrates yesterday to be sentenced for offences involving the intervention of the man dressed as Batman.
Frayne, 28, of Sandringham Road, admitted supplying a cheque for use in fraud and handling a stolen cheque on January 31.
Rebecca Dolby, prosecuting, said a burglary was committed in Bradford between January 26 and 27.
Frayne tried to cash a cheque valued at £300 in Bradford and produced his passport and other documents as supposed verification.
But his attempt failed and the cheque was seized by a cashier because it was discovered that the cheque book it came from had been stolen.
He claimed the cheque was payment for work he had done but was told the cheque had been stolen.
He said: "How am I supposed to get my wages, then?"
Rumana Burhan, mitigating, said Frayne was struggling to cope with a drug addiction at the time and had been living a chaotic lifestyle.
"He was trying to stabilise himself," she said.
Frayne had suffered a drug addiction for about four years but was now committed to trying to stay off drugs, with the help of his family.
Unemployed Frayne was given a one-year supervision order, including six months' drug treatment, and was ordered to pay £85 costs and a Government-imposed £60 victims' surcharge.
After the hearing, Frayne declined to comment on the Batman incident.
The involvement of the Batman character was not mentioned in court, but Miss Burhan later confirmed that she understood that the Batman footage shown on TV related to these fraud-related incidents.
She added that Frayne and the man dressed as Batman, Stan Worby, were due to have another case, involving burglary, mentioned at Bradford Magistrates' Court on Friday.
Miss Burhan said both men were expected to be denying burglary and a date for a trial was likely to be fixed.
ON THE WEB: View the footage online at www.thisisgrimsby.co.uk
