Toerags lifted

Four men have been jailed after police launched an operation to catch a gang who had been stealing from lorries.

David Whiteley and Gareth Hunt were sentenced to 18 months, Richard Ward was given 16 months and Dominic Bailey was handed a 12 month sentence.

The men all pleaded guilty to conspiring to steal from a motor vehicle between July and December 2012.

A man called police in the early hours of July 18 last year to report that he could see four men taking items from a lorry parked in Garnham Close, Somercotes and loading them into a van.

The men had gone when police arrived but they had left a van behind, which contained the stolen property. A stanley knife was discovered inside the van and later fingerprinted. The prints matched those of Dominic Bailey while DNA found on a bottle inside the van matched Richard Ward and the pair were arrested.

Police linked the crime to subsequent offences where property was taken from lorries in Somercotes and several suspicious incidents where men in an Audi had been seen looking at lorries parked up in South Normanton. On one occasion, David Whiteley was identified as the driver and Gareth Hunt as the passenger.

Police set up night-time patrols around Somercotes and when Whiteley and Hunt were sighted in Somercotes again, they were arrested.

Whiteley (33) gave his address in court as HMP Nottingham although he was living in Leeds at the time of the offences. Hunt (31) gave the same prison address but also lived in Leeds previously. Ward (43) is of no fixed abode while Bailey (23) is of Edison Way, Guiseley, Leeds.

The group were sentenced at Derby Crown Court on Wednesday, July 31.

Two men have been charged in connection with a series of diesel thefts from vehicles in the Glossop area.

Luke Hinchcliffe (25) and Peter Butler (54) were arrested on Thursday, August 8 and charged with three counts of theft from vehicles.

The charges relate to siphoning of diesel from vehicles at Turnlee Quarry on August 2 and July 23 and from Howe Plant Limited on July 12.

Hinchcliffe, of High Street West, and Butler, of Gladstone Street, will appear at High Peak Magistrates’ Court today (Friday, August 9).

A third man, aged 28, was arrested on suspicion of theft and released on bail pending further inquiries.

If you are leaving the lorry, make sure you fasten it to a zb big Rottweiler :stuck_out_tongue:

18 months,big deal!!,they’ll be out in 9,possibly 6 if they behave or if the jails are too full,joke justice !! :laughing:

Named and shamed. They can’t help it! Still, like I always say, if only they came to associate their crimes with immediate pain, they might learn not to do them.

Gareth Hunt, wasn’t that cockney rhyming slang for something back in the day?

Snudger:
Gareth Hunt, wasn’t that cockney rhyming slang for something back in the day?

Did Gareth have a brother called Michael?

No. His brother was called Isaac.

Ken.