A yob has been jailed after trying to steal a watch worth more than £182,000 from a man weeks after stealing thousands of pounds of cash from a G4S van making a delivery.
William Robinson's crime spree started on June 22 last year in Longsight when the 28-year-old, with Shera Patrick and Thomas Warwick, watched on as a G4S member of staff delivered cash to the Lloyds Bank on Stockport Road. After watching him make a number of deposits to the bank, Robinson and Warwick jumped out of the car and charged at the man.
Robinson hit him to the hand with a baton before Warwick swiped the IBOX containing £25,000, Manchester Crown Court heard. The pair then ran back to an Audi, driven by Patrick, to make their escape. The G4S driver pressed a silent alarm soon after they were hit and activated a “detonator” which deactivates the box and destroys the cash, but they were unsure that this would have worked as they needed to be within a certain radius.
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Two days later, on June 24, the same Audi was stopped and Patrick found to be driving it. She was arrested on suspicion of robbery, and receipts were found in the vehicle including £436 worth of JD Sports goods and a three-piece sofa worth £1,500.
On her mobile phone, they found a voice note which she said: “Aww I’m s****ing myself mate. Erm, but we only got erm… f***ing 10 out of it or somat. I don’t know. I just tried to ring you then, you didn’t answer.”
A victim impact statement was also read out by prosecutor, Hayley Bennett, with the G4S driver saying: "Nobody has the right to assault me while I'm earning an honest living and something I've done for 10 years." It also left him "shaken and traumatised".
Little over a month later, Robinson was involved in another sickening attack - this time in the up-market villages of Hale and Bowdon in Trafford. On August 2 last year, a 63-year-old had travelled with friends to Hale village and spent the afternoon in Victors restaurant.
Ms Bennett told the court that the man noticed someone walk past him twice during the day looking at the watch he was wearing, which was "very rare" and worth more than £182,000. The group spent the afternoon at Victors before dropping one of them off in a taxi to East Downs Road, Bowdon.
All the group then exited the taxi when two men wearing balaclavas and holding batons approached them "shouting for the watch". Ms Bennett told the court they then raised the batons "in a threatening way" before the 63-year-old was "thrown to the floor" by Robinson, who was tugging at the watch on his wrist. The victim was kicking out at Robinson who was also kicking at him on the floor, the court heard.
Another man in the group, had his high value Rolex watch taken off him during the assault and a Louis Vuitton bag with valuable items in. Robinson was only able to take the strap of the watch off the first victim's wrist, worth £12,000 alone, before the attackers escaped in a black Peugeot.
The victim and local residents, who "heard screaming", were able to take a picture of the car for the police, and he called Victors to warn them about what had just happened. The manager later told police there had been a man sat outside the restaurant on his own with a drink while the group were there who "looked out of place".
Police attended Victors and found a wine glass with Robinson's fingerprints on, and viewed CCTV which showed Robinson at the restaurant before the robbery. Local CCTV also showed Robinson getting into and out of the black Peugeot near Victors while he followed the group.
A victim impact statement read to the court described that despite not being injured he has suffered "trauma" and that he keeps waking "up in a panic". "It's an image I can't get out of my mind," he says. "I've worked hard all of my life to buy these things and the watch has a lot of sentimental value but I don't want to wear it again. I shouldn't have to worry about being assaulted."
Defending Robinson, Richard Simons, told the court that Robinson had received many positive references from family and friends and he pleaded guilty to the two counts at the first opportunity. He also described the robberies as purely financially motivated as Robinson was in "significant debt" at the time which had "spiralled out of control".
Judge Elizabeth Nicholls sentenced Robinson to six years and 11 months behind bars for the two robberies. This included two years and 10 months for the cash in transit robbery from the G4S van plus four years and one month for the robbery in Bowdon.
In a previous sentencing, Patrick, of Sale, and Warwick, of Manchester, pleaded guilty to robbery for the G4S attack and were each jailed for four years and one month.
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