Category Archives: Crime

Two Come Dine With Me winners convicted for importing cannabis

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Nicholas Panayiotou and Eleanar Attard among gang who planned to smuggle 58kg of the drug into the UK

Members of a gang, including two former winners of a Channel 4 cooking programme, have been convicted after their plan to import large amounts of cannabis was uncovered.

Nicholas Panayiotou, Eleanar Attard, Constantinos Zavros, Luke Wileman and Koby Haik planned to smuggle 58kg of cannabis into the UK from the US, but were foiled after a theft at a London airport, the Metropolitan police said.

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Gun crime survivors create scheme to stop violent partners owning firearms

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Some police in England and Wales now ask spouses to flag dangerous traits or mental health problems

Survivors of gun crime committed by violent and coercive partners have worked with police to create a groundbreaking scheme designed to stop more dangerous offenders being allowed licensed firearms.

The women have helped police frame a questionnaire that firearms officers put to the partners of people wanting a licence that will flag up issues such as a propensity to violence or mental health problems.

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Two men jailed for life for murdering footballer Cody Fisher

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Remy Gordon and Kami Carpenter given minimum terms of 26 and 25 years at Birmingham crown court for nightclub attack

Two men have been jailed for life for the murder of footballer Cody Fisher in a nightclub attack in Birmingham on Boxing Day 2022.

Remy Gordon, 23, and Kami Carpenter, 22, had blamed each other for stabbing the 23-year-old former Birmingham City academy player, who died at the scene from a chest wound.

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Man jailed for life for murdering wife and dismembering body in Lincoln

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Nicholas Metson, who paid a friend £50 to help dump Holly Bramley’s remains, to serve at least 19 years

A man who cut his wife’s body into more than 200 pieces and then paid a friend £50 to help him dump her remains in a river has been jailed for life with a minimum term of 19 years.

Nicholas Metson stabbed Holly Bramley, 26, at least four times in March 2023 before dismembering her body and storing her remains for a week in the kitchen larder at the flat they shared in Stamp End, Lincoln.

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Human remains found at Salford reserve belonged to man dead ‘a matter of days’

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Greater Manchester police, who have launched murder inquiry, say victim was likely to be older than 40

Human remains found wrapped in plastic at a nature reserve in Greater Manchester are those of a man older than 40 and who had been dead for only a matter of days, police said.

A human torso was found on the Kersel Wetlands, former home of the Manchester racecourse, on Thursday evening, Greater Manchester police said.

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Family criticise police over possible discovery of body of sex offender linked to mother’s death

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Relatives of Kelly Faiers say police failed to properly inform them that a body had been found

The family of a woman found dead at a sex offender’s home have criticised the police’s “bodged” investigation after his body is believed to have been found this week in a caravan close to where he vanished six months ago.

Relatives of Kelly Faiers said they were upset at how the news about the possible discovery of Richard Scatchard’s body was broken, claiming they did not have time to alert others close to Faiers before the police went public.

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Murder inquiry launched after human remains found in Salford reserve

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Greater Manchester police say they are working to identify victim after body part found in Kersal Wetlands

Police have launched a murder investigation after human remains were found at a nature reserve in Greater Manchester.

A body part believed to be a torso was found by passersby in Kersal Wetlands in the Salford area on Thursday evening. Greater Manchester police (GMP) confirmed on Friday afternoon the body was in a state that meant it was “not possible for the victim to have survived”.

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Tehran denies involvement in London attack on TV presenter

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Met police say investigation into stabbing of Iranian journalist near home in Wimbledon is being led by counter-terrorism officers

Iran’s most senior diplomat in Britain has denied claims that the Iranian government was behind a knife attack on a TV presenter in London amid growing fears over threats to dissidents.

The country’s charge d’affaires, Mehdi Hosseini Matin, said Iran “denies any link” to the stabbing of Pouria Zeraati, 36, a presenter at Iran International, outside his home in Wimbledon on Friday. He is in a stable condition and was looking forward to being discharged from hospital soon.

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Gary Glitter victim seeks about £500k damages for ‘terrible impact’ on life

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High court judge to rule on level of compensation awarded to woman sexually abused by pop star

One of Gary Glitter’s victims is seeking about half a million pounds from the disgraced musician in damages, the high court has heard.

The woman is suing Glitter, whose real name is Paul Gadd, after his 2015 conviction for abusing her and two other young people between 1975 and 1980.

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Ex-Liverpool youth footballer Jamie Cassidy jailed for cocaine conspiracy

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Jamie Cassidy was sentenced to 13 years and three months for his part in an international drug operation

A former Liverpool football prodigy of “exceptional talent and promise” has been jailed for more than 13 years for his part in a multimillion-pound drugs conspiracy.

Jamie Cassidy, 46, was “drawn” into the drugs business by his brother Jonathan Cassidy, 50, who the court heard joked about having the same birthday as the Mexican drug lord Joaquín Guzmán, also known as El Chapo.

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Man jailed for ramming motorcyclist off Milton Keynes bridge in ‘extreme’ road rage

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Nikesh Mistry, 34, caused serious injuries after using his BMW to try to force the motorbike off the road

A man has been jailed for ramming a motorcyclist off a Buckinghamshire bridge in what police described as an act of “extreme” road rage.

Nikesh Mistry, 34, repeatedly tried to force the motorcyclist off the road, which resulted in him sustaining serious injuries, police said.

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Home Office breaks pledge to fund sex-crime research after Everard murder

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Government was to look at whether offenders tend to commit increasingly serious crimes after outcry over warning signs with police officer Wayne Couzens

The government has failed to fund research into the escalation of sex crimes, despite promising to do so in the wake of the kidnapping, rape and murder of Sarah Everard.

In 2021, the Home Office pledged to “take forward work looking at the escalation of sexual offending” as part of its plan to tackle violence against women and girls. The plan, which had the tagline “the safety of women and girls across the country is our priority”, was informed by 180,000 public submissions after Everard was killed by serving police officer Wayne Couzens.

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Police examine unsolved murders of women in Glasgow after Packer trial

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Trial drew attention to violence faced by sex workers in city, where the cases of four women killed in 1990s remain unresolved

Police Scotland is examining several unsolved murders of women in Glasgow after the trial of the serial rapist and killer Iain Packer highlighted the horrific levels of violence facing sex workers in the city.

Packer was sentenced to at least 36 years in prison last Wednesday for the murder of Emma Caldwell in 2005 and a catalogue of other sexual and violent offences, including 11 rapes.

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Vulnerable man ‘humiliated’ into confessing to 1990 London murder, court told

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Court of appeal hears Oliver Campbell was convicted on basis of inconsistent confession made under police pressure

There is a “crescendo of concern” from psychological experts that a vulnerable man was convicted of murder on the basis of a false confession, the court of appeal heard on Wednesday.

Oliver Campbell was convicted of murdering east London shopkeeper Baldev Hoondle 33 years ago after telling police he had shot him. But Campbell, 53, suffered profound brain injuries as a baby, leaving him with significantly impaired cognitive ability.

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‘It’s on our doorstep’: Bristol’s fearful parents seek answers after three knife deaths in three weeks

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As teenage victims are mourned across the English city, some believe the return of youth centres would keep children safer

Terre Baptiste has been checking her teenage son’s whereabouts compulsively since a 16-year-old boy was fatally stabbed two weeks ago in a park a mile away from their home in the east of Bristol.

“It is very worrying,” says Baptiste, in her living room. “Bristol isn’t a perfect city. But there weren’t stabbings one after the other. It was few and far between. Now it is on our doorstep.”

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‘It’s not about glorifying crime’: ex-convicts in demand for talks and tours

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You can dine with a former mobster for £999, as the ‘true crime’ TV and podcast trend translates into live events

Nearly 30 years after the “hitman” murder for which he was jailed for life, Kevin Lane will take to the stage of the Cambridge Country Club this month to share his thoughts on crime and punishment.

For anyone who saw him recently in the Channel 4 programme Banged Up, explaining to a gobsmacked Tory MP, Johnny Mercer, an unconventional method for smuggling contraband into jail, it will also be a chance to question him about the 24 years he has served behind bars.

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Woman who handed over British girl, 3, for FGM in Kenya given seven years

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Amina Noor travelled from north London with the child to Kenya where the procedure was carried out in 2006

A woman who was found guilty of handing over a three-year-old British girl for female genital mutilation (FGM) during a trip to Kenya has been jailed for seven years.

Amina Noor, 40, was convicted last year of assisting a Kenyan woman to carry out the procedure overseas in 2006. The conviction was the first for assisting in such harm under the Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003.

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Violence and abuse against UK retail staff rises to 1,300 incidents a day

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British Retail Consortium says criminals ‘being given a free pass’, with thefts more than doubling to 16.7m incidents last year

UK shop workers are facing 1,300 incidents of violence and abuse a day and a battle to control “brazen” acts of shoplifting, as pressure mounts on ministers to intervene to protect retail employees.

Retailers saw the number of incidents of racial abuse, sexual harassment, physical assaults and threats with weapons rise 50% last year, while thefts more than doubled to 16.7m incidents, according to the British Retail Consortium (BRC), the trade body which represents most major retailers.

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Brianna Ghey’s mother warns tech bosses more children will die without action

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Exclusive: Esther Ghey says she believes social media use left her daughter vulnerable, while killers were able to access violent content online

The mother of Brianna Ghey has called for her murder to be a “tipping point” in how society views “the mess” of the internet, warning that a generation of anxious young people will grow up lacking resilience.

Esther Ghey said technology companies had a “moral responsibility” to restrict access to harmful online content. She supports a total ban on social media access for under-16s – a move currently under debate in certain legislatures, including Florida in the US.

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