This list includes 10 people locked up for crimes linked to Merseyside this past week.
Our courts heard about a man who helped run a £9m plot to distribute cocaine across Britain. Meanwhile, one judge sentenced a drug addict who dragged a pensioner down the street in a despicable failed robbery.
Judges had to sentence a burgling mum who wept as she was led to the cells for a jail term which means she might not see her father alive again. They also sentenced an abusive boyfriend who wouldn't let his partner shower or go to the toilet alone.
READ MORE: The boy who thought he could rule South Liverpool by terror
A twisted paedophile who took children's underwear with him when he went to meet what he thought was an 11-year-old girl was sentenced. A court also heard about a fugitive crook linked to a Russian pistol.
Here is an overview of some of those which have concluded this past week.
Stephen Crook
Coked-up brute Stephen Crook made his girlfriend live her life "on edge" and "always waiting for the next assault".
He sobbed as a court heard how for seven years he subjected his partner to "consistent abuse". The 32-year-old would punch, kick, strangle and spit at his victim.
Much of the abuse centred around Crooks' demands for cash for cocaine or to pay off drug debts. He even threatened to "chop off her head and put it in a box".
The woman, who the ECHO chose not to name, said Crook, of Exeter Street, St Helens, wouldn't let her shower or go to the toilet alone, have friends or contact with family, or go on social media. On February 21 this year, when she didn't answer his demands for money for cocaine, he threw a cupboard door that had come off its hinges at her.
Crook then put his hands around her throat and squeezed her neck. He continued until her nose began to bleed.
He admitted controlling and coercive behaviour between 2015 and 2022 and assault causing actual bodily harm, in relation to the February 21 attack.
Crook was jailed for two years and three months.
David Welsh
David Welsh who dragged an 81-year-old woman down the road "like a rag doll" asked a judge to give him the maximum sentence.
The 22-year-old interrupted his sentencing hearing to apologise for his behaviour. Welsh relapsed into drug use after his dad's cancer diagnosis and tried to grab the pensioner's handbag so he could feed his habit.
The victim determinedly hung onto her bag, which was wrapped around her body, despite him kicking her as she lay on the road between two parked cars. People nearby heard her screams for help and came to her aid. Welsh was detained and arrested.
Welsh, of Vanbrugh Road, Walton, admitted attempted robbery over the incident, at around 4pm on February 10 this year, in Priory Road, Anfield. The court heard he has mental health problems and was the son of a crack addict who was put in care as a toddler.
Judge Gary Woodhall accepted Welsh was genuinely remorseful and took into account his "tragic, traumatic extreme upbringing". He pointed out that it did not excuse his behaviour, but his duty was to impose the least possible sentence commensurate with his offending and jailed him for three years and eight months.
Thomas Wright
A Huyton joiner was part of a gang who transported heroin and crack cocaine between Liverpool and Wrexham.
The group was blown apart after officers busted several doors and discovered the true scale of the operation. Seven of the 11 members of the Wrexham-based crew were sentenced this week, including "trusted" courier Thomas Wright.
They were operating a major drug supply chain over roughly a year between March 2020 and 2021. Their patch was predominantly in and around Wrexham, a place that the judge said was already "suffering greatly" from a drug problem.
Thomas Wright, 44, of Fairfield Avenue, Huyton, was branded as the "upstream supplier". Wright - who sourced "kilos upon kilos" of hard drugs for the gang to shift in the Wrexham area and was convicted of being part of the Class A drug conspiracies - was jailed for 10 years.
His defence barrister, Julian Nutter, claimed the "respectable" joiner was threatened into joining the trade. It was said he had been "forced" to work for criminals higher up the drugs supply chain.
Ethan Birch
Social media cyber groomer Ethan Birch drove to Widnes with children's underwear in the boot to meet an '11-year-old girl'.
The 20-year-old turned up at the car park of the DCBL Stadium on Lower House Lane, Widnes, on Friday, January 21, with "knickers and crop tops" and a change of boxer shorts for himself after 10 days of messages online including sexual incitement and sending obscene images of himself.
Unbeknown to Birch, of Little Lowes Meadow, Lowton, Warrington, the supposed child was really an adult decoy out to snare paedophiles preying on the young online. When Birch arrived, adults from a group called Cobra UK confronted Birch and rang Cheshire Police, who arrived and arrested him.
Birch admitted five counts of attempting to cause a child to engage in sexual activity, two counts of attempting to cause a child to watch a sexual act, attempting to meet a child following grooming, attempted sexual communication with a child, and attempting to cause a child to engage in sexual communication.
He was locked up for four years and eight months.
Steven Mallon
Jewellery shop robber Steven Mallon was tackled to the ground by police after being hit by an SUV while fleeing.
CCTV footage of the "blatant and audacious" raid - carried out in front of passers-by - was played in court after the only gang member caught appeared for sentencing. Mallon's five accomplices leaped onto two motorcycles when police rushed to the scene, Rebecca's Jewellery Shop in Southport, taking the other bike out of action.
Mallon was tackled to the ground and arrested when he tried to flee on foot and was knocked over by a small SUV. The raid was carefully pre-planned and the gang was equipped with an angle grinder, axe, hammer and crowbar.
The "clearly organised" burglary happened just after 9pm on Monday, March 21 this year. Three of the men, all in black and wearing helmets, waited on the motorbikes while the others, including Mallon, were involved in breaking in during an estimated £80,000 raid.
One of them used an angle grinder, from which large showers of sparks were seen, to cut through the metal shutter and then a grille inside the shop. Mallon, 43, of Briarwood Road, Aigburth, admitted robbery.
He was jailed for two years and eight months.
David Houghton
David Houghton jumped into the Manchester Ship Canal after speeding the wrong way up the M6.
At 1.17pm on Wednesday, April 6 this year, officers spotted a white Volkswagen Transporter on the M6 southbound near to junction 21 at Woolston Interchange. Intelligence suggested the driver of the van, Houghton, 43, did not have a licence and officers tried to stop the van.
He pulled off the motorway onto the A57 roundabout and appeared to stop for officers. However, he then made off at speed.
Houghton drove the wrong way down the M6 on two occasions and travelled at speeds well above the 50mph limit. Despite abandoning a chase on two occasions due to the manner of his driving, officers followed Houghton from a safe distance to the A50 Knutsford Road.
Houghton eventually turned off onto Thelwall Lane, a dead-end road. He abandoned his vehicle and fled before jumping into the Manchester Ship Canal. He was arrested as he got out of the water on the other side.
Houghton, of no fixed address but from Liverpool, admitted dangerous driving and failing to provide a specimen. He was jailed for 16 months.
Lisa Fletcher and Lee Owens
Burgling mum Lisa Fletcher wept as she was led to the cells for a jail term which means she might not see her father alive again.
Fletcher and her then partner Lee Owens stole more than £1,200 of stock from an independent shop in Maghull last year. The couple were caught after an off duty police officer spotted them in an Indian restaurant and recognised them from CCTV.
The pair targeted Ryat Menswear on Moreton Way on November 21, waiting until the owner went out to get lunch before ransacking the shop in the space of a minute. They took £1,285 in stock from the shop.
Police found CCTV of the pair but were unable to locate them until the next month, when an off-duty officer went for a meal at a restaurant with his partner. He spotted the thieves at another table and rang the police.
Owens tried to pickpocket another diner and the officer got him on the floor before he and his girlfriend were arrested. The couple, both of Drake Crescent, Fazakerley, admitted burglary and Fletcher told the court she cared for her father who is seriously ill with cancer.
Owens was jailed for three years and a tearful Fletcher for 16 months, as she moaned through tears: "But my dad is going to die."
Gary Stanley
A man found a loaded gun at the bottom of his garden after two thugs threatened to shoot him.
The homeowner disturbed the masked men lurking outside his house in Childwall. They issued the chilling threat before fleeing on a motorbike.
When he searched around his property, the victim spotted a holdall in woodland backing onto his address. It contained a Russian semi-automatic pistol - bearing the DNA of fugitive crack dealer Gary Stanley.
Stanley dived off a boat into a canal in a futile attempt to swim away from police when caught by officers in June 2020. He was wanted at the time for crimes including threatening to skin his ex-girlfriend alive and biting her.
Stanley, of Kingsland Road, Norris Green, was jailed for five years that summer. He was back in the dock in connection with the discovery of the firearm, in Lanfranc Close at around 7.20pm on February 14, 2020.
He wasn't located until June 17 that year, when he jumped off a boat into the Leeds and Liverpool canal at Burscough. Stanley, now 33, admitted possessing a prohibited firearm and possessing ammunition without a certificate.
He was jailed for six years.
Behnam Tavakoli-Juibari
Behnam Tavakoli-Juibari who helped run a £9m plot to distribute cocaine across Britain kept details of his gang's deals in notebooks.
He acted as the bookkeeper for a crew responsible for shifting huge amounts of Class A drugs. The 37-year-old is the last of the gang to be sentenced but was finally jailed after being extradited from the Netherlands and admitting his role in the plot.
The group supplied hundreds of kilos of drugs in England, Wales and Scotland throughout the first half of 2016, with eight members jailed for a total of 106 years in May 2018. The plot, which focused on the supply of cocaine but also included heroin, MDMA, and diazepam, was mainly run from the Wirral, but collapsed after Merseyside Police's Operation Wessex.
Officers raided an address used by the group, seizing a £1.4m stash including more than 9kg of cocaine, 7kg of unadulterated heroin, 10,000 MDMA pills and 11,000 diazepam tablets.
Bookkeeper and courier Tavakoli-Juibari, of Woodlands Avenue, New Brighton, admitted his role in the plots.
He was jailed for 15 years.
Receive newsletters with the latest news, sport and what's on updates from the Liverpool ECHO by signing up here
