A painter and decorator agreed to courier a shotgun wrapped in a bin bag and a hi-vis jacket in order to clear a £300 debt.
Mark Sands was responsible for handling the transportation of the weapon just over a week before it was fired at the door of a house with an eight-year-old boy inside. The 47-year-old, who was said to have treated the firearm as a "hot potato", today thanked a judge as he was locked up.
Liverpool Crown Court heard this morning, Friday, that he had taken the gun to a "safehouse" on Alexandra Road in Birkenhead, the top floor flat of Teigan Dutton, eight days before the incident in October 2021. Frank Dillon, prosecuting, described how John Bromilow went on to collect the shotgun and was driven to Percy Road in Wallasey by Paul Price, where he fired two blasts at the door.
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A Merseyside Police investigation ensnared five conspirators, also including 21-year-old Chantae Campbell, via CCTV footage, cell siting data and automatic number plate recognition. Bromilow was evidenced to have been in contact over the phone with both Campbell and Sands - of Briardale Road in Oxton, Wirral - in the period leading up to the latter delivering the firearm on October 21 2021.
CCTV recovered from Dutton's street showed her and Campbell stood outside the address when the gunman-to-be arrived, followed shortly thereafter by Sands in his partner's red Ford Fiesta. Bromilow, of Whetstone Lane in Birkenhead, is then seen approaching the car and removing a "long, thin item wrapped in black" from the rear passenger seats - attempting to cover it in a hi-vis jacket "in an attempt to disguise its appearance" - then taking it inside.
Mr Dillon said: "The prosecution say that long, thin item is the shotgun. The prosecution say that this footage demonstrates that Ms Dutton was storing a firearm at her home address on behalf of John Bromilow with the full knowledge and connivance of Mark Sands and Chantae Campbell."
Then, at around 9pm on October 29, 28-year-old Bromilow returned to Dutton's flat and was seen leaving in possession of a "long, thin camouflage case" - said to contain the shotgun - while Campbell, of Bridge Street in Birkenhead, was also in attendance. Price, 42, subsequently drove him to Percy Road in a stolen Volkswagen Golf R.
Ring doorbell camera footage captured him exiting the front passenger seat and firing two shots at the front door of a house from the pavement. A "traumatised" mum, her eight-year-old son and fiancé were inside at time - she in the kitchen and the man and boy upstairs.
Police searched 20-year-old Dutton's apartment on November 10 and found six shotgun cartridges in a Lidl carrier bag under her bed. The Miroku double-barrelled over and under shotgun, which had been stolen during a burglary in August 2021, was then discovered in a shed in the back garden of a house on Carlton Road in Birkenhead on February 9 last year inside a camouflage case "strikingly similar" to that seen on the night the shots were fired.
Sands, who has a total of 29 convictions for 59 offences, failed to appear alongside his co-defendants during their sentencing hearing in March. Bernice Campbell, defending, told the court that the dad was a painter and decorator who has worked around the globe - including in Spain.
She added: "He borrowed £300 from his co-accused. That bill increased and increased and increased to the point where he could not pay it back, no matter how much he wanted to.
"He was told to do them a favour. He tells me he was told to pick it up from Ellesmere Port and drop it off in Birkenhead.
"He was not naïve enough to think it was a snooker cue or a fishing rod. He did it because he wanted to pay that debt off, he was in fear."
Ms Campbell stated that Sands had failed to appear in court previously as he had been instructed to smuggle illicit items into jail ahead of his impending imprisonment, saying: "He was frightened because he was told to do something illegal and he didn't want to. He refused to do it.
"There is light at the end of the tunnel. He is capable of changing his ways.
"Now his debt is paid off, he feels he can breathe a sigh of relief. He knows he has a long way to go.
"It was a hot potato to him. He was doing it because he was frightened."
Sands admitted conspiracy to possess a shotgun. Appearing via video link to HMP Liverpool, he replied "thank you very much your honour" after being jailed for 25 months.
Sentencing, Judge Dennis Watson KC said: "You were, at the very least, reckless as to whether it would be used for criminal purposes. It was being acquired and stored for the business of enforcing a turf war.
"It was used to enforce the law of the mob. Anyone who lives in this city knows the devastation caused by lethal weapons being used by criminals.
"Your role here did in fact assist in organised crime. Your role was important, it was needed to be stored locally for the job that Bromilow and Price had in mind."
Bromilow and Price, of no fixed address, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to possess a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence and were imprisoned for six years and three months and five years and 10 months respectively. Campbell and Dutton admitted conspiracy to possess a shotgun and were handed terms of 15 months each.
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