Natasha Lee Parker, 38, arrested after fleeing court

A woman who walked out of a Townsville Magistrates Court immediately after receiving a jail sentence has been rearrested by police - while playing the pokies at the pub.

The woman was caught playing the pokies.

A woman who walked out of a Magistrates Court immediately after receiving a jail sentence, was caught playing the pokies in a suburban Townsville hotel, said police sources.

Natasha Lee Parker, 38, walked out of Court 3 of the ground-floor Townsville Courts complex just before 12.30pm on Monday, telling everyone she was hot and needed to get some air.

She had just been sentenced to six months jail for 19 offences involving theft, drugs and traffic matters.

Police arrested Parker in the gaming room of the North Ward pub, Hotel Allen, at about 11.30am on Tuesday.

She told police she had escaped to be with her children, but a police source told the Bulletin the children were being cared for by Parker’s mother and she had not visited for some time.

On Wednesday, Parker’s case was mentioned in court with her facing a charge of escaping from legal custody. Parker remained in the watchouse.

Magistrate Peter Cooke adjourned the matter until March 12 with Parker likely to appear by video from the womens’ correctional centre.

Witnesses told the Townsville Bulletin that on Monday, she walked through the court reception area to one of two exits to Wills Street with a man, whose name is not known, following her.

He was calling out: “Natasha, come back. Natasha, come back.”

“Then she got in a car with (a man) driving and there were no registration plates on the car, and he drove off,” said a court security officer.

“We would have stopped her if we’d known there was a problem.”

After sentencing her to six months’ jail, Magistrate Richard Lehmann told Parker to sit in the rear of the court and wait for police officers to arrive.

She was immediately agitated, trying to tell him the offences were committed while she was under the strain of fearing for her safety, but he told her to be quiet and that the case was over.

He then left the room.

But she stood in the front of the courtroom, saying “Oh, my God”, then took off her jacket off saying she was hot and began fanning herself with the ends of her blouse.

Her lawyer Phil Rennick warned her not to leave the court, but she ignored him and walked out the door.

He then asked her boyfriend to go and bring her back and the man immediately left the court.

A few minutes later, a male and a female police officer walked into the court, but by then Parker had left the area.

Earlier the mother of three, who was on bail, had pleaded guilty to the 19 charges and the court had heard they involved a range of petrol thefts between June and December last year.

Originally published as Natasha Lee Parker, 38, arrested after fleeing court