Man who filmed himself coughing at Christchurch supermarket during lockdown sentenced

The man who filmed himself coughing in a Christchurch supermarket during the Covid-19 lockdown has been ordered to pay $750 plus $130 court costs for the offending.

But Raymond Coombs will spend the next 16 months in custody for other unrelated alcohol offences.

Coombs pleaded guilty to a charge of offensive behaviour on April 6 after he put a video of himself on Facebook in Barrington’s Fresh Choice supermarket coughing and sneezing, at times within half a metre of customers.

In relation to that charge, in sentencing Judge Raoul Neave told the Christchurch District Court it was hard to imagine a more serious example of offensive behaviour than this.

He called the behaviour “dangerous, selfish and stupid”.