A twisted killer who burned a mother-of-two alive after raping her and a mum and dad who 'worked together' to murder their 10-month-old son were just some of the worst offenders sent to jail in the UK in May.
Other criminals facing lengthy jail terms include a wealthy Nigerian politician who plotted to traffic a young man to the UK to harvest his kidney, a gang who supplied fake passports to some of the UK's most wanted criminals and the paedophile brother of former This Morning presenter Phillip Schofield.
A dangerous driver who killed a mum while 'showing off' in his Range Rover, the mastermind behind an online fraud shop and a Brit who travelled to Syria to join a terrorist organisation after vanishing on a family holiday in Turkey were also locked up in the last month.
These are some of the most shocking court cases that have been widely reported in the UK in recent weeks.
Ashley Kemp
A skydiving instructor who strangled his girlfriend in her home was jailed for a minimum of 19 years. Ashley Kemp was given a life sentence for the murder of 50-year-old Clair Armstrong, who owned a beauty salon and was also a skydiving instructor.
Judge John Thackray KC told a court that the relationship was ending and Kemp, 55, had decided “if you could not have her, nobody could”. The court heard how a teenager had made sexual allegations against the defendant which had led to him losing his job and put a huge strain on the couple’s relationship.
Sentencing Kemp, of Robinson Grove, Hibaldstow, North Lincolnshire, at Hull Crown Court, Judge Thackray said the circumstances of the attack at the mother-of-three’s home were “devastating, tragic and brutal”. The court heard that on the day of the attack, Ms Armstrong had told Kemp the relationship was over and he had to move out.
The trial heard how Kemp made a 999 call on November 6 last year in which he said: “I have killed my girlfriend. We got into a fight, and I ended up strangling her.” The defendant had fled the scene and crashed into a tree between the villages of Hemswell and Willoughton, where he was arrested.
The judge described the “undoubted terror” Ms Armstrong must have felt as the defendant headbutted her and then strangled her, saying “she was undoubtedly fighting for her life”. In his sentencing remarks, he added: “No sentence I impose can give the sons of Clair their mother back. No sentence I impose can undo what you, Kemp, have done.” He said Ms Armstrong was “a wholly blameless victim of a violent attack upon her”.
Timothy Schofield
The paedophile brother of former This Morning presenter Phillip Schofield was jailed for 12 years after being convicted of child sex offences. Timothy Schofield, 54, was convicted of 11 sexual offences involving a child between October 2016 and October 2019, including two of sexual activity with a child, after a trial at Exeter Crown Court in April.
Schofield, a civilian police worker from Bath, Somerset, told the jury while giving evidence that he had watched pornography with the boy, who he insisted was over the age of 16 at the time. He claimed they had masturbated while sitting apart and denied performing sexual acts on the teenager.
However, the jury found Schofield guilty on all counts with a majority of 10-2 after more than five-and-a-half hours of deliberation. Mrs Justice Cutts, sentencing Schofield at Bristol Crown Court on Friday, told him: “You exploited his innocence at this stage of his life for your own sexual gratification. It was wrong on every level for you to behave as you did."
The judge, who imposed a sexual harm prevention order on Schofield and barred him from working with children, commended the courage of the boy for reporting the abuse. After sentencing Schofield, she said: “I sincerely hope that the boy and his family find a way to move forward from the dreadful events and I commend him for his bravery.”
In a victim personal statement read to the court, the boy said he felt “numb to life” following the abuse. He said: “Before Tim was arrested, I felt I had no freedom. I often felt panic, stress and fear. I felt like I was trapped in a loop of fear and anxiety of the abuse happening again. It was only after Tim was arrested that I felt safe. It was only after Tim was arrested that I felt free – free to be me, free to be happy, free to be relaxed.”
In a statement released by his lawyer after his brother's conviction, Phillip Schofield said: “These are despicable crimes, and I welcome the guilty verdicts. As far as I am concerned, I no longer have a brother.”
Shannon Marsden and Stephen Boden
Two parents who “worked together” to murder their “perfect” 10-month-old son were jailed for life after what a judge called “unimaginable cruelty”. Shannon Marsden and Stephen Boden – described as “monsters” by a relative – inflicted “vicious and repeated assaults” on their son, Finley Boden, in the space of just over a month in their filthy home near Chesterfield, Derbyshire.
Finley fatally collapsed on Christmas Day 2020 and was found to have 130 separate injuries at the time of his death, as well as conditions including sepsis and pneumonia. The injuries included a broken pelvis, broken shoulder, fractured shinbone, fractured collarbones, several fractured ribs and four separate thighbone fractures, as well as 71 bruises and other burns, with his blood, vomit and faeces found on his clothes and body.
Handing Marsden and Boden life sentences with respective minimum terms of 27 and 29 years at Derby Crown Court, Mrs Justice Amanda Tipples said the pair were “persuasive and accomplished liars” who “brutally assaulted” their son. She said: “You both knew that Finley was very seriously ill and dying… yet you deliberately failed to seek any medical help for him and you made sure that he was not seen by anyone that could have rescued him and taken him away from your care."
The court was told that by the evening of December 23 Finley was "plainly dying". The judge said: "There was nothing subtle about this at all. It was plainly obvious to both of you.” The pair showed no emotion and remained silent during sentencing, while family members wept in the public gallery as the judge detailed the horrific abuse they inflicted on Finley.
Finley was exposed to what prosecutor Mary Prior KC said were “vicious and repeated assaults” at the family home in Holland Road, Old Whittington, near Chesterfield, that culminated in his “savage and prolonged” murder. She said during the trial that the broken pelvis was possibly from sustained “kicking or stamping”, with injuries likened to a multi-storey fall.
As their son’s condition deteriorated, Boden, 30, and Marsden, 22, hid him from social workers and family members for the last month of his life despite them making several attempts to see him, with Mrs Prior saying the pair told a “series of persistent lies”. A social worker visited the family home on November 19 and noticed Finley had a 4cm bump on his head, which Marsden claimed was due to him hitting his head on a toy, an explanation that was accepted by social services.
Dereck Owusu and Louis James
Two men were locked up for the murder of a “Good Samaritan” who came to the aid of a teenage girl. Reece Radford, 26, was stabbed as he intervened after seeing a 17-year-old girl being attacked in Sheffield city centre on September 29 last year.
Dereck Owusu, 40, of Strathmore Grove, Rotherham; and Louis James, 46, of Manor Lane, Sheffield; have now been jailed for life after being found guilty of murder. They have been told they must serve a minimum of 15 years and 25 years in prison respectively, South Yorkshire Police confirmed.
Officers said that Owusu and James were on Arundel Gate in Sheffield, just before 1am, when they bumped into a teenage girl they knew. They shared some alcohol before a violent altercation occurred, with Owusu punching the 17-year-old girl in the face.
Mr Radford witnessed this and officers said he acted as a “Good Samaritan” by stepping in to help the teenager, punching Owusu in the face as a fight broke out between him and the defendants. Mr Radford fell to the floor, where he was kicked by the two men, before crossing the road and collapsing to the ground having been stabbed.
Mr Radford died six days after the attack from a single stab wound to the chest. In a statement read out in Sheffield Crown Court, his mother, Laura Radford, said: “It was not just my son who was killed that night, my family was killed, my heart is broken."
She added: “Reece was the life and soul of this family. He would light a room up as soon as he came in. He wasn’t just my son, he was my best friend, my soulmate, my everything. It is killing me knowing I am never going to see his big brown eyes, never going to hear his laugh or see him grow into the best daddy ever. That has been taken away from us.”
Stephen McHugh
A drug dealer murdered a 22-year-old woman when he deliberately drove into a crowd of pedestrians. Stephen McHugh has now been jailed for life with a minimum term of 18 years.
A court heard how the 28-year-old snorted about eight lines of cocaine and downed six beers and ten double shots of spirits before driving his Volvo S60 onto a footpath in Oswestry, Shropshire. Bystander Rebecca Steer was crushed underneath the vehicle near a takeaway and died of “catastrophic” injuries, a two-week trial at Stafford Crown Court was told.
McHugh, originally from Fazakerley in Liverpool but living near Oswestry at the time of the killing, admitted manslaughter and assault, claiming he was trying to frighten pedestrians after an earlier altercation nearby. Jurors deliberated for eight hours and 39 minutes over three days before convicting McHugh of murder and trying to wound a friend of Ms Steer’s who was also knocked down.
McHugh, of Artillery Road, Park Hall, near Oswestry, is known to have snorted cocaine less than five minutes before he drove his gold-coloured car into Willow Street at about 2.45am on Sunday October 9 last year. CCTV shown to the court caught McHugh stopping in the road and exchanging words with a group of people near the Grill Out takeaway.
McHugh, who has previous convictions related to dealing cannabis and cocaine and the seizure of sawn-off shotgun in Merseyside in 2019, treated pedestrians “like they were human skittles", judge Mr Justice Andrew Baker told the court.
The court heard family victim impact statements about how Ms Steer wanted to become a police detective and was in the final year of a criminal justice course at Liverpool John Moores University. In one of the statements, Ms Steer’s mother described Rebecca as the “most loving, talented and kind-hearted person who you could have wished to know”.
Rhys Bennett
A man who burned a mother-of-two alive was jailed for 24 years for her rape and murder. Rhys Bennett admitted sexually assaulting and killing Jill Barclay in Aberdeen in September 2022.
The court heard that after raping the 47-year-old, who leaves behind a partner and two children aged six and eight, Bennett poured petrol on her and set her alight.
He was jailed for life and told he must serve a minimum of 24 years before he is eligible to apply for parole. Sentencing Bennett, 23, from Ballingry in Fife, at Edinburgh High Court, Lord Arthurson said: “Your crimes against Ms Barclay were unimaginably wicked and indeed medieval in their barbarity.”
Prosecutor Lorraine Glancy KC told the court forensic evidence suggested Ms Barclay had been alive when she had been set on fire. Bennett did not know her before the attack, and met her while she was on a night out.
After meeting her at a pub, Bennett followed her as she made her way home, before launching an attack, which the judge described as involving "extreme, sustained and frankly feral violence”. He assaulted Ms Barclay by repeatedly hitting and kicking her, stamping on her head and body, and hitting her head against a down pipe. He then raped her, before pouring petrol on her and setting her alight.
Lord Arthurson told him: “The available evidence tells the horrible truth that your victim was still living at the time that the fire was set. To be crystal clear: you burned her alive.”
Bennett was given a punishment period of 24 years for the rape and murder, and four years for defeating the ends of justice, to run concurrently. He was also placed on the sex offenders register indefinitely.
Ike Ekweremadu, Beatrice Ekweremadu and Obinna Obeta
A wealthy Nigerian politician and his wife were jailed for plotting to traffic a young man to the UK to harvest his kidney for their sick daughter in a legal first. Following a landmark modern slavery case, multi-millionaire Senator Ike Ekweremadu, 60, his wife Beatrice, 56, and medical “middleman” Dr Obinna Obeta, 51, were found guilty at the Old Bailey in March.
Their victim, a poor street trader in Lagos, was brought to the UK to provide a kidney for the Ekweremadus’ 25-year-old daughter Sonia. He fled in fear of his life and walked into a police station to report what had happened after the Royal Free Hospital called a halt on the private £80,000 procedure.
In a televised sentencing, Mr Justice Johnson recognised Ike Ekweremadu’s “substantial fall from grace” as he jailed him for nine years and eight months. Beatrice Ekweremadu was jailed for four years and six months and Obeta for 10 years. It is the first time anyone has been convicted under the Modern Slavery Act of an organ-harvesting conspiracy.
The senior judge said: “People-trafficking across international borders for the harvesting of human organs is a form of slavery. It treats human beings and their body parts as commodities to be bought and sold. It is a trade that preys on poverty, misery and desperation.”
During the hearing, the victim, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, said he only found out what was planned when he was taken to the north London hospital for an initial consultation. In a statement read to court, they said: “I would never (have) agreed to any of this. My body is not for sale.”
On the question of harm to the victim if the intended transplant went ahead, the judge said: “He would have faced spending the rest of his life with only one kidney and without the requisite funding for the required aftercare.” He added the risks had not been properly explained and there had been no consent “in any meaningful sense”.
David Boyd
The killer of a seven-year-old girl who was murdered in 1992 has been jailed for nearly 30 years. David Boyd, 55, tricked Nikki Allan into following him to waste ground, then sexually assaulted her, or tried to, before he killed her to shut her up, Newcastle Crown Court heard.
The sex offender murdered Nikki in a derelict building in Sunderland’s East End in a “brutal” way which must have terrified his victim, judge Mrs Justice Lambert said. But the judge reduced what she would now have imposed as a 37-year minimum term to one of at least 29 years behind bars, because the sentencing regime in the early 1990s was less harsh.
Outside court, Nikki’s mother Sharon Henderson, 57, called for a public inquiry into the police’s handling of the original case. And she said: “I would have been satisfied with life (a whole life term). This is a seven-year-old bairn. When is anyone going to take crimes like this seriously?"
Boyd was convicted of murder earlier this month after jurors heard he battered his victim with a brick and stabbed her in the chest 37 times, then left her dead or dying in the basement. Mrs Justice Lambert found that Boyd lured her away to the Old Exchange Building from the relative safety of the Garths flats, where she lived, that October night in 1992 to sexually assault Nikki, or to try to.
She screamed and Boyd hit her on the lip and forced her through a window, six feet off the ground, into the building. The judge said: “She must have quickly known she was trapped. She must have quickly known you were coming after her to hurt her. It was cold and dark. It must have been a truly terrifying experience for this seven-year-old girl.”
Boyd remained at large while an innocent man stood trial for the killing, before he was acquitted on the orders of the judge in 1993. Boyd was free to indecently assault a nine-year-old in a Teesside park in 1999 and he later told his probation officer he had previously had sexual fantasises about “young girls”.
Vanushan Balakrishnan and Ilyas Suleiman
Two teenagers fatally stabbed a 16-year-old Afghan refugee in the mistaken belief he was a member of a rival gang. Rishmeet Singh was stabbed 15 times after being chased through a park in west London by Vanushan Balakrishnan and Ilyas Suleiman, both 18, in November 2021.
Two years before, Rishmeet, a college student and aspiring police officer, sought asylum in the UK with his mother and grandmother, after his father was killed by the Taliban in Afghanistan.
The court had heard how Rishmeet had spent the evening before his death with friends in the park. Meanwhile Balakrishnan and Suleiman, then aged 17, set out on bicycles armed with two blades, a “terrifying” three-foot long machete and a Rambo knife bought online days before. They both wore Covid masks and put their hoods up to hide their identities.
The court was told they had deliberately set out for a “glide” or gang attack on enemy gang territory. As Rishmeet headed for home he saw the two males running towards him and ran back towards his friends warning them to “run, run”. He tripped and fell in Raleigh Road, where he was fatally stabbed by the defendants in an attack lasting 27 seconds. Police and medics were alerted by a member of the public and Rishmeet died at the scene.
Balakrishnan and Suleiman, from Hillingdon, west London, were found guilty of murder following an Old Bailey trial in March. In a televised sentencing at the Old Bailey, Judge Sarah Munro KC locked up the defendants for life - Suleiman with a minimum term of 21 years and Balakrishnan for at least 24 years.
Balakrishnan was also detained for a minimum concurrent term of four years for a second offence of causing grievous bodily harm with intent. He had admitted attacking a fellow inmate at a young offenders institute while on remand, leaving the victim with severe brain damage.
Judge Munro said: “This case is yet another tragic example of the needless loss of a young teenager following a violent stabbing on the streets of London. This case is the more tragic because Rishmeet was an entirely innocent victim. He was described as a good person who would not hurt a fly. He was never involved in any kind of violence. It defies belief you two sought him out to kill him.”
Anthony Beard, Christopher Zietek and Alan Thompson
A gang supplied “golden ticket” falsified passports to fugitive criminals including murderers and drug dealers. High-level criminals paid up to £20,000 for the fraudulently obtained genuine passports, which enabled them to go on the run and start a new life abroad in countries including Spain, Portugal and cities such as Dubai.
Anthony Beard paid vulnerable people for their expired passports so he could apply for renewals using their names but criminals’ photos. He was sentenced to six years and eight months at Reading Crown Court after admitting conspiracy to pervert the course of justice and conspiracy to make a false instrument with intent.
Beard, 61, from Sydenham, south east London, put contact numbers of his own burner phones on official forms and countersigned some of them himself as he shepherded more than 100 fraudulent applications through to completion. Evidence of his offending went back to 2007, but Beard was heard bragging that he had been operating the scam for 20 years.
In 2019 he began working with Christopher Zietek, a broker who represented a Glaswegian crime gang allegedly run by two brothers and a man described both as Zietek’s “trusted lieutenant” but also his “dogsbody”, Alan Thompson. Zietek, 67, who had homes in Sydenham, Ireland and Spain, was jailed for eight years for conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, conspiracy to make a false instrument with intent and converting criminal property. Thompson, 72, from Sutton in Surrey, was sentenced to three years for the same offences.
Passing sentence, Deputy Circuit Judge Nicholas Ainley said of the scheme: “It was to enable very wicked, sophisticated, violent criminals to escape justice by providing them with documents that because they were genuine would deceive the authorities to enable them to escape.” He said that Zietek was “clearly the organiser”, providing a link to serious criminals, while Beard was “the leg man” and Thompson had a lesser role.
Once the passport scam was uncovered, the fake identities of around 50 fugitives were discovered and they were arrested.
Dennis Akpomedaye
A murderous ex-boyfriend stabbed a Polish student to death in an alleyway after she ended their relationship. Dennis Akpomedaye, 30, tried to decapitate Anna Jedrkowiak while stabbing her almost 40 times having stalked her from his home in Newport, South Wales, last May.
Akpomedaye, who was born in Nigeria, met Ms Jedrkowiak online in January 2021 and they dated for around a year before she ended the relationship. In the weeks before her murder Akpomedaye, who could not accept the break up, began trying to manipulate her by threatening suicide.
Wearing a balaclava and with his hood up, he waited for the 21-year-old, known as Ania, to finish her shift at a Las Iguanas restaurant in west London before following her and a young man she was close with. Judge Rajeev Shetty, jailing Akpomedaye at Kingston Crown Court, said the attack was “ferocious and savage”.
Jack Maskell, 21, who worked at the restaurant, was walking with Ms Jedrkowiak when she was murdered after the pair became “more than just friends”. He told the court: “I have been left with indescribable memories that can never been erased. It was dark and cruel. I will never unsee what he did to her.” Mr Maskell said seeing the killing has left him with “significant emotional problems” such as post-traumatic stress disorder and depression.
Rida Kazem
A driver killed a mum while “showing off” at speeds of up to 110mph in his Range Rover. Rida Kazem, 24, was driving beautician Yagmur Ozden, 33, and their friend Zamarod Arif, then aged 26, home from a night out in west London when he lost control of his vehicle.
Ms Ozden and Kazem were thrown from the car as it ploughed through a Tesla car park, ending up on a west London railway track. Ms Ozden died of her injuries, while Kazem later had his left leg amputated below the knee. Ms Arif, who was the only one wearing a seatbelt, sustained serious injuries – including a broken arm and leg – in the crash.
Kazem’s black Range Rover Sport SVR, valued at up to £180,000, hit a top speed of 110mph on the 40mph-limit A40 westbound before he lost control, hitting a curb. CCTV footage of the incident played at Isleworth Crown Court showed the airborne vehicle crash across a pavement, through a fence and into a lower-level car park. Spinning nose-over-rear, the Range Rover hit a stationary Tesla, occupied by a taxi driver, who was charging the car, before the wreckage ended up on the tracks at Park Royal Tube station.
Judge Martin Edmunds KC jailed Kazem, from Greenford, west London, for seven and a half years after he previously pleaded guilty to causing death by dangerous driving and causing serious injury by dangerous driving. “The speed and violence of this crash is simply horrific, and the Range Rover was reduced to a mangled heap of metal,” the judge said. “I have no doubt you were showing off to your passengers – showing off your powerful car but also what you thought of as your superior driving skills. What is all too clear is your skills were all too inadequate.”
Kazem was told he will serve at least two-thirds of the sentence and was banned from driving for more than 12 years.
Peter Nash
A man who murdered his wife and their 12-year-old daughter was described as a “monster” by the woman’s mother as he was jailed last month. Police found the bodies of Jillu Nash, 43, and her child Louise at their home in Great Waldingfield, Sudbury, Suffolk, in September last year.
Peter Nash, 47, was found covered in blood and holding a knife. He had strangled his wife after she began a relationship with a work colleague. Nash then tried to gas himself and his non-verbal autistic daughter to death and, when this failed, he stabbed her in the stomach and stabbed himself in the chest multiple times.
Nash was found guilty of their murders following an earlier trial at Ipswich Crown Court. Mr Justice Edward Murray sentenced Nash at the same court to life in prison, setting the minimum term as 40 years. The judge told the defendant: “Even if you live a long life, there’s a strong possibility, given your current age, that you will die in prison.”
He said Nash “attempted to justify these murders with relation to a deeply flawed set of beliefs about the law that you’ve got from internet searches”. He said the defendant had shown no remorse for the killings.
Mrs Nash’s mother Dhruti Shah, who was also Louise’s grandmother, fought back tears as she read her victim impact statement in court. She described Nash as a “living human monster”, adding: “He took life like they were toys in his hands.”
Michael Harrison
A man waited for almost four hours to call an ambulance after inflicting fatal injuries on his “undernourished” 11-year-old son. Michael Harrison pleaded guilty last month to the murder of Mikey Harrison, who died in hospital in June last year after paramedics were called to a country park.
The court was told that he repeatedly punched Mikey, who weighed 3st 11lb, at his home in Derbyshire on the morning of June 18, causing a fatal laceration to his liver. The 41-year-old later drove to Heanor’s Shipley Country Park, phoned the ambulance service from his van and falsely claimed Mikey – who could have been saved by prompt treatment – had fallen from a tree.
Harrison has now been jailed for life with a minimum term of 21 years and six months. Passing sentence at Derby Crown Court, Judge Shaun Smith KC told Harrison: “What you did that morning ended the life of a little boy and emptied the lives of many others.”
READ MORE: Dad who claimed 11-year-old son fell from tree jailed for life for his murder
The judge added that what happened during the assault was a result of Harrison “going crazy” as he damaged furniture and caused multiple blunt-force injuries to Mikey. Following the assault, the court heard, Harrison stripped the Heanor property where he and Mikey had been living “of almost every item that you would expect to find in a home”.
After he was sentenced, Harrison, wearing a white T-shirt with “FAMILY” printed on the front, gestured towards members of the media and said: “I will always love my family no matter what you lot say. Put whatever version you like.”
Denis Kadena
A 34-year-old man was jailed for the “horrific” rape of a 13-year-old girl who he winked at as she walked to school before he lured her into his van and attacked her.
Denis Kadena drove past the schoolgirl in Totton, Southampton, when he stopped and persuaded her to get into his vehicle on September 14. He then sexually assaulted her before tricking her into the back of his van where he raped her.
Kadena, of Yorke Street, Southsea, was convicted of rape and sexual assault by a jury at Southampton Crown Court and sentenced to 11 years in prison with a four-year licence extension with a lifetime sexual harm prevention order.
A Hampshire police spokeswoman said: “The sentence comes after the girl reported that whilst she was making her way back to school … an unknown man in a white van approached her and offered her a lift – which she accepted under false pretences offered by Kadena."
They added: “Kadena had initially passed the girl, winked at her, before turning the van around to follow her. Whilst in the van, Kadena sexually assaulted her before driving her to a layby. He then told her that he needed help with something in the back of the van, where he raped her before dropping her off near her school.”
Kadena was arrested on September 20 after a police officer spotted him driving in the area and recognised him from the description given by the victim.
Tejay Fletcher
The mastermind behind an online fraud shop used to con victims out of more than £100 million was jailed after the site was brought down last year in the UK’s biggest fraud sting. Tejay Fletcher made around £2 million from the iSpoof.cc website.
The website earned around £3.2 million in cryptocurrency Bitcoin, with the “lion’s share” ending up with Fletcher, a court heard. With his earnings, he bought a £230,000 Lamborghini, two Range Rovers worth £110,000 and an £11,000 Rolex.
Fraudsters were supplied with tools from the site that disguised phone calls so they appeared to be from a trusted organisation, such as a bank, so they could empty their targets’ accounts. Police said iSpoof was created in December 2020 and at its peak had 59,000 users, with up to 20 people per minute targeted at one point by callers using technology bought from the site.
Fletcher, 35, pleaded guilty to four charges, including making or supplying an article for use in fraud, encouraging or assisting the commission of an offence, possession of criminal property and transferring criminal property, between November 30 2020 and November 8 2022. Judge Sally Cahill KC jailed him for a total of 13 years and four months, telling him: “For all the victims it was a harrowing experience.”
One victim lost £3 million, while the 4,785 people who reported being targeted to Action Fraud lost an average of £10,000, according to police. The judge said they suffered damage to their businesses, personal financial problems, sleeplessness, depression, emotional stress and fall-outs with family members.
Fletcher was arrested at his girlfriend’s house in east London last November in a global operation to bring down iSpoof as part of the UK’s biggest fraud sting. Judge Cahill praised the Metropolitan Police force for its investigation, which involved 700 days of work.
Scott McCulloch
A man murdered his 84-year-old grandmother by repeatedly punching and stamping on her, causing her to die from her injuries six days later. Scott McCulloch, 26, pleaded guilty to murder and was handed a life sentence with a minimum term of 15 years when he appeared by video link at the High Court in Edinburgh.
The court heard McCulloch, from Forres in Moray, lived with his grandmother Patricia Bitters at her home in Oystercatcher Close. McCulloch had been drinking with friends on August 28 last year and returned home just before 10pm.
He admitted repeatedly punching and stamping on Mrs Bitters, who was just 4ft 9in and weighed 49kg. The court was told neighbours had reported hearing a male shouting aggressively and then a woman shouting, “Help, help, stop, stop, no”, before they went to Mrs Bitters’ house. They found McCulloch standing on the pavement saying: “I’ve killed my granny, I’ve killed my granny. I didn’t mean it.”
Mrs Bitters was found lying on her side on the floor, pressed against a cabinet with blood coming from her mouth. Neighbour Wendy Harrower asked Mrs Bitters what had happened and she replied that her grandson had assaulted her, telling her: "He just lost it.” The court heard how Mrs Bitters said to Mrs Harrower as she lay there: “Don’t leave me, I don’t want to die alone. Please don’t leave me when I die.”
Mrs Bitters was taken to hospital where a CT scan showed significant haematoma and haemorrhage in her brain, as well as bruising to her sternum. The court heard the pattern of injuries was consistent with being stamped on numerous times. Mrs Bitters died on September 3 and a post-mortem examination showed she had a subarachnoid haemorrhage, brain hypoxia, and a hardening of the arteries over many years.
The judge reduced the time McCulloch must serve before being eligible for parole from 17 years to 15, after taking into account his remorse and his early guilty plea.
Alan Madden
An extreme right-wing “conspiracy theorist” who kept a semi-automatic pistol in his bedroom has been locked up for seven-and-a-half years.
Officers discovered the firearm in a box when they raided the home of Alan Madden, 65, in the model village of Port Sunlight in Wirral. They also found 384 rounds of ammunition, including prohibited hollow-point ammunition, which expands on impact, Liverpool Crown Court heard.
Madden's sentencing hearing also heard that two laptops and a mobile phone were seized and a search of the devices showed he had “extreme right-wing views” and an “unhealthy interest in firearms, weapons and proscribed organisations”. He told police he would not have used the weapon other than in “extreme circumstances” to defend himself and his wife in the event of a “complete breakdown in society”.
Judge David Aubrey KC said: “You repeated you did not envisage needing to use the firearm in the UK but in 2020, in the early stages of the pandemic, you wondered whether social order may break down amidst civil unrest and you were glad you had it in case this led to you or your wife being exposed to the risk of attack.”
Madden told officers he was viewed as a “conspiracy theorist”, as well as describing himself as a “survivalist”, and did not believe the government would look after his safety. The court heard he brought the weapon when he returned from South Africa, where he lived for 49 years. Three sets of nunchucks and a flick knife were also recovered from his home.
READ MORE: Man with 'extremist views' smuggled in handgun and bullets from South Africa
Madden shared videos online through his BitTube channel, including speeches from Adolf Hitler, the court heard. Officers searching his devices found the manifesto by the man behind the Christchurch terror attacks in New Zealand as well as calls to action. He also shared a video promoting proscribed terrorist organisation National Action, the court heard.
The court heard Madden, of Boundary Road, admitted dissemination of a terrorist publication on the basis he was reckless. He pleaded guilty to three counts of stirring up racial hatred but said he did not intend to cause racial hatred, although he accepted it was likely it would have been stirred up by his actions. Madden also admitted possession of a prohibited firearm, possessing prohibited ammunition, two counts of possessing ammunition without a firearms certificate, three counts of possessing an offensive weapon in a private place and possession of a flick knife.
Shabazz Suleman
A British man travelled to Syria to join so-called Islamic State after going missing during a family holiday to Turkey. Shabazz Suleman has been given a life sentence after making the trip nine years ago.
Suleman, from High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, was 18 when he disappeared in 2014. The former grammar school boy was arrested at Heathrow Airport in September 2021 and charged with a string of terror offences.
In April, he pleaded guilty to preparing acts of terrorism by travelling from the UK to Turkey in order to join IS in Syria in August 2014. The defendant, now 27, was also charged with being a member of IS, a proscribed organisation, between 2014 and 2017, and receiving training in the use of firearms.
However, these two charges were left to lie on file after the prosecution said Suleman’s guilty plea addressed them. Judge Mark Lucraft KC jailed Suleman for life with a minimum term of nine years and six months at the Old Bailey.
He said: “You went to Syria in order to join IS. You understood IS was a proscribed organisation in English law.” He added: “Your ambition was to become a sniper."
The court heard that in the months leading up to his departure to Turkey, Suleman’s exchanges with fellow pupils at school showed he “fully appreciated” he would be joining and supporting a terrorist organisation which engaged in “indiscriminate violence against civilians”. In February 2014, he shared “shocking” images of violence linked with IS on a WhatsApp group and sought to play down their “horror” by comparing them to cartoons from Horrible Histories.
The court heard Suleman messaged his family on the day he disappeared insisting he was “not brainwashed” and had been “planning this for months”.
Allan Scott
A homeless man murdered an elderly woman, who let him move into her home, before burning her body on a bonfire in her garden. Patricia Holland, 83, met Allan Scott while he was selling his paintings on the street in Gorleston in Norfolk, Norwich Crown Court was told.
Scott had lodged with the pensioner at her home in the town, but he killed her and then burnt her body in the garden after she asked him to leave due to his drunken and aggressive behaviour. In the hours after, Scott went to buy gin and tonic from a local shop using Mrs Holland’s bank card.
The 42-year-old was found guilty of murdering Mrs Holland and admitted to preventing her lawful burial. He has now been jailed for life with a minimum term of 35 years.
Mrs Holland’s daughter Kathryn Holland said in a victim impact statement that following a fall in 2014, Mrs Holland “no longer had the ability to judge people’s intentions accurately”. “She thought Allan Scott was her friend,” she said.
Prosecutors said Scott tried to make it look like Mrs Holland had gone missing as, according to the terms of her will, he would have been liable for eviction if she had died. The judge told him: “I do not consider you showed a shred of remorse for what you did.”
Jake Drummond and Louise Lennon
A couple were locked up over the death of a 15-month-old boy who was murdered following a campaign of “cruel and sadistic” abuse. Jacob Lennon suffered a catalogue of injuries to his face, body and genitals over three weeks at the hands of his mother’s cocaine addict boyfriend Jake Drummond.
Then on August 27 2019, Drummond, 33, fatally shook and hit the little boy, leaving his face so bruised and swollen he was described as looking like a “panda”. Jacob’s mother Louise Lennon, 32, not only failed to stop it, she joked with Drummond, blamed another child for the injuries, and lied to social services to avoid anyone finding out after her case was downgraded.
Following a trial at the Old Bailey in March, Drummond was found guilty of murder and wounding Jacob by extreme pinching or biting his penis and piercing his scrotum with a skewer. Lennon was found guilty of allowing Jacob’s death, having admitted child cruelty.
Mr Justice Sweeting handed Drummond a life sentence with a minimum term of 32 years for murder and six years to run concurrently for wounding. Lennon was handed 10 years with six years’ imprisonment concurrent for the cruelty charge.
In the televised sentencing, the senior judge said Drummond was “emotionally volatile” which was made worse by his drug use. He rejected Lennon’s claim that she was coercively controlled by her boyfriend, saying she had prioritised her relationship over her son’s welfare.
The judge said photographs taken by Lennon of Jacob’s injuries were “truly shocking” and noted one of her friends had described his head as looking like a “basketball”. Detective Chief Inspector Wayne Jolley, of Scotland Yard, said it was the saddest case of his 30-year career, and “distressing and emotional” for all those involved.
David Smith
A “sadistic sexual killer” was jailed for more than 25 years for the murder of an escort – three decades after he was cleared of the crime.
Lorry driver David Smith, 67, was acquitted of killing Sarah Crump, 33, in 1993, after a trial at which her mother warned he would kill again. Smith went on to commit an almost identical murder of another sex worker, Amanda Walker, 21, in 1999, for which he has served 24 years of a life sentence.
Both women were sexually mutilated by Smith, who was known to colleagues as the “Honey Monster” or “Lurch” because of his 6ft 3in height and heavy build.
Ms Crump, a secretary in the chiropody department at Wimbledon Hospital, south-west London, had lived a double life as an escort and Smith visited her at her one-bedroom flat in Southall, west London, in 1991.
Smith denied murdering her but was finally found guilty at Inner London Crown Court this week after Court of Appeal judges ordered a retrial because of “new and compelling evidence”. Mr Justice Bryan handed him a life sentence with a minimum term of 27 years minus the 479 days he spent on remand in the 90s, meaning he will serve at least 25 years and 251 days.
Ellie Jacobs
A mother who killed her five-week-old son with an overdose of paracetamol during lockdown was jailed for five years. Ellie Jacobs, 19, admitted the manslaughter of Archie Jacobs and child cruelty.
Luton Crown Court heard a 999 call was made on June 5 2020 after Archie went into cardiac arrest at a property in Biddlesden, Buckinghamshire. He was pronounced dead at the scene despite the efforts of paramedics.
A post-mortem examination found the youngster’s cause of death was acute paracetamol toxicity. Jacobs admitted administering the dose as well as breaking the toddler’s leg and foot in the days before he died.
READ MORE: Teenage mum killed newborn baby boy with paracetamol overdose
The teenager, from Rushden, Northamptonshire, was arrested and charged with murder last October but a guilty plea to manslaughter was later deemed acceptable.
Patrick Muddiman
A robber left his provisional driving licence at the crime scene after threatening staff at a Co-op. Patrick Muddiman, 38, threatened staff at store in High Street, Brampton, and demanded cash, Cambridgeshire Police said.
He was handed about £120 in £5 and £10 notes and also demanded a packet of cigarettes after staff told him £20 notes were kept elsewhere and they did not have access. A customer restrained Muddiman, of Whiteford Drive, Kettering, Northamptonshire, but he managed to flee, punching a second customer who tried to help with the restraint.
Muddiman accidentally left a black wallet, containing his provisional driving licence, outside the shop and he was later arrested by police. He gave no comment in interview but later admitted robbery and assault by beating.
The theft of the cash and damage to the shop amounted to between £400-500 but the Co-op also lost about £7,000 in business after closing for a day, police said.
Muddiman was sentenced at Peterborough Crown Court to six years in prison, with a further three years on licence, police said. The defendant has 24 previous convictions for 36 offences including theft, violence and other robberies, the force added
Frank Farrell
A convicted murderer who beat his partner to death has been jailed again after being found guilty of raping, “humiliating and degrading” two other women in the years before the killing. Frank Farrell, 38, is already serving a life sentence with a minimum term of 24 years, after his 2021 conviction for the murder of his girlfriend Smita Mistry.
His latest, 12 year sentence will be served consecutive to the life term and, although eligible for parole after two-thirds of the new sentence has elapsed, Farrell would be aged around 70 by the time he could apply for release.
Earlier in May, Farrell was also convicted after a trial of five counts of rape – encompassing multiple repeated incidents of sexual assault – and five charges of inflicting actual bodily harm between 2009 and 2015. Jurors in that trial – who were not told he was already in prison for murder – returned unanimous verdicts on all but one of the counts, delivering a 10 to two majority on one of the charges of actual bodily harm.
His conviction for murder could be reported only after restrictions were lifted at the end of the recent trial. Farrell refused to come up from his cells for the Leicester Crown Court hearing on Monday, prompting sentencing judge Mark Watson to remark he had “treated these proceedings with contempt and lacks the courage, now, to face the sentence”.
Jailing Farrell, the judge said he had treated each victim “as his own possession” to satisfy his “substantial sexual appetite”, assaulting both women “on a regular basis” and exposing them to “humiliating and degrading” treatment. He said: “Both women described promising and happy beginnings to the relationship with Farrell; he was helpful, considerate and attentive towards them and their families, something neither had recent experience of. But over time his demeanour changed, and he began to control their lifestyles.”
The judge said Farrell, formerly of St Peters Road, Leicester, was a “significant risk” to women, adding the jail terms had been “substantially reduced to take account of the time he must serve on his current sentence”, but would be “consecutive to the life sentence he is serving”. He added: “He is a serial offender against women with the capacity to assault and rape his partners at will."
Ajmal Shahpal
A Twitter user was convicted of encouraging terrorist acts after he posted an image of a terrorist victim’s severed head online. Ajmal Shahpal urged others to decapitate those who insult Islam, a hearing at Birmingham Crown Court heard.
He was jailed for five-and-a-half years after being found guilty of sending tweets which would encourage people “to commit, prepare, or instigate acts of terrorism”. The 41-year-old, of Birkin Avenue, Radford, Nottingham, had denied the offences despite praising the killer of French school teacher Samuel Paty for being “as brave as a lion”.
Shahpal was assisted by an Urdu interpreter as he was sentenced for one count of intentionally encouraging terrorist acts and one of doing so recklessly. The judge, Melbourne Inman KC, told the court Shahpal expressed "extreme Muslim ideology, which included the immediate murder by beheading of anyone considered to have committed blasphemy".
Shahpal was told he would be subject to a 12-month extended licence period after serving a five-and-a-half-year prison sentence.
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