Detective from force’s specialist crime unit says cross-border operation was the result of four years’ work
Three men have been convicted after a £2m vase stolen from a museum was recovered in a police sting operation.
The Chinese Ming dynasty vase was stolen from the Museum of Far Eastern Art in Geneva, in Switzerland in June 2019. Three men plotted to sell it on for hundreds of thousands of pounds, but were caught in a Scotland Yard operation.
Continue reading...Guardian investigation also reveals Countess of Chester hospital executive feared contacting police would ‘damage reputation’
Lucy Letby’s colleagues were ordered to apologise to her after repeatedly raising concerns that the nurse may have been behind a series of unexplained baby deaths, the Guardian has learned.
Senior doctors had warned for months that Letby was the only staff member present during the sudden collapses and deaths of a number of premature babies on the Countess of Chester hospital’s neonatal unit.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Man imprisoned for rape he did not commit says Criminal Cases Review Commission has yet to contact him
Andrew Malkinson, who spent 17 years in prison for a rape he did not commit, has accused the body that investigates miscarriages of justice of having an “attitude problem” and said it had still not contacted him since he was cleared by the court of appeal last month.
Malkinson and his legal team first heard that the Criminal Cases Review Commission was launching a review into its handling of his case after the Guardian contacted them about it on Thursday.
Continue reading...Jonathan Nuttall convicted of conspiring to plant two devices targeting lawyers for the National Crime Agency
A businessman with a “deep-seated grudge” against two lawyers at the National Crime Agency has been found guilty of planting two devices resembling bombs at the heart of London’s legal district to intimidate them.
Jonathan Nuttall, 50, was convicted at the Old Bailey of planning to plant the explosives over a £1.4m legal dispute with the NCA, which put him at risk of losing his stately home, Embley Manor in Hampshire.
Continue reading...Abuse of girls, viewed as ‘mere objects for defendants to use, abuse, humiliate then discard’, started when they were 12 and 13
Two brothers are among five men from Rochdale to have been found guilty of sexually exploiting two girls from the ages of 12 and 13.
The girls were “mere objects for the defendants to use, abuse, humiliate then discard”, Manchester Minshull Street crown court heard.
Continue reading...Judge says comic, known for his character Ivan Brackenbury, does not pose a risk to public
A comedian who has appeared on Channel 4’s 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown has been sentenced after being found with more than 35,000 indecent images of children.
Tom Binns, whose character is the hospital DJ Ivan Brackenbury, pleaded guilty last November to five counts of making indecent images of children and one of possessing a prohibited image.
Continue reading...Information about victims of crime, witnesses and suspects included with freedom of information responses, forces say
Two police forces in England have admitted mishandling the sensitive data of victims, witnesses and suspects in cases including domestic abuse incidents, sexual offences, assaults, thefts and hate crime.
Norfolk and Suffolk police said the data of 1,230 people was included in files responding to freedom of information requests and apologised.
Continue reading...Metropolitan police sending extra officers to central London street after speculation of ‘crime opportunities’
Sadiq Khan has encouraged people not to travel to Oxford Street to take part in a social media craze that he has described as “nonsense”.
The Metropolitan police has said there will be a heightened police presence in the central London area after speculation about an event on Wednesday afternoon advertised on TikTok.
Continue reading...Mahek and Ansreen Bukhari convicted over killing of pair who died when car was rammed off road
A former TikTok influencer and her mother have been found guilty of murdering two men who died in a fireball when their car was rammed off the road during a late-night chase outside Leicester.
Mahek Bukhari, 24, and her mother, Ansreen Bukhari, 46, were convicted alongside two other defendants of killing Saqib Hussain and his friend Mohammed Hashim Ijazuddin, both 21, in February last year.
Continue reading...Ansreen Bukhari and her daughter, Mahek, partied together and ended up plotting to murder two young men
When she gave evidence at Leicester crown court, 46-year-old Ansreen Bukhari described how her daughter’s fame on TikTok had completely transformed her life.
“When I got married I was like a housewife, but with this TikTok thing I was going out more. It was like two different lives,” she said. “It was more excitement. We were out and meeting people and stuff.”
Continue reading...Police in remote Welsh town appeal to anyone who may have seen someone have ‘sudden influx of beehives’
Police in a remote Welsh town are on the hunt for a thief who stole 14 beehives.
Witnesses have been urged to come forward after the hives disappeared from Blackwood Road near Llangollen, North Wales, over the weekend.
Continue reading...Geza Tarjanyi barged into former health secretary on train while shouting conspiracy theories
An anti-vaccine protester who accused Matt Hancock of murdering people during the coronavirus pandemic has been found guilty of harassment.
The former health secretary feared being pushed down an escalator by Geza Tarjanyi, 62, of Leyland, Lancashire, who shoulder-barged him and “shouted ridiculous conspiracy theories” on two separate occasions on 19 and 24 January.
Continue reading...Sir Bob Neill criticises government plan for failing to consider mental health and addiction problems of many offenders
Ministers cannot “warehouse” addicts and people with mental health problems who commit crimes such as shoplifting, a senior Conservative MP has said in response to a plan to give shoplifters mandatory sentences.
Sir Bob Neill, the chair of the Commons justice select committee, said the new policy would “pump low-level offenders” into almost-full jails at huge public expense and do nothing to change the “chaotic lives” of offenders.
Continue reading...Government also plans to make greater use of facial recognition technology as part of crime crackdown bill
Shoplifters, burglars and violent criminals who commit repeat offences will be handed mandatory prison sentences under plans being drawn up by ministers.
The government plans to force judges to impose jail terms when sentencing repeat offenders for shoplifting, burglary, theft and common assault, using new legislation to be included in the crime and justice bill.
Continue reading...Essex police continue to appeal for witnesses after release of video leads member of public to rescue pet
Twiglet, the miniature dachshund who was stolen by a masked man during a burglary, is safe and well and has been reunited with her owner, police have said.
Officers in Essex launched a dog-hunt, releasing a video of the theft and appealing for information after an intruder took the 16-month-old dachshund from her home in Catmere End, Saffron Walden, at about 3pm on Wednesday.
Continue reading...Disappearance of Tony Parsons in 2017 finally resolved after Alexander McKellar took girlfriend to burial site
Twin brothers who left a cyclist to die on a remote Highland roadside after hitting him with their pickup truck and hiding his body in a pit used for animal carcasses have finally been brought to justice after one confessed to his new girlfriend.
The disappearance of the “much-loved” grandfather and passionate fisher Tony Parsons in the middle of a 100-mile charity fundraiser in September 2017 left his close family “heartbroken” and the authorities baffled. He had vanished seemingly “into thin air”, according to the police who searched for him.
Continue reading...Regulators to be asked about how £10m scam was investigated, as Guardian Today in Focus podcast raises fresh questions about case
Financial regulators are to be summoned to parliament to explain how they prosecuted the case of a multimillion-pound pensions fraud whose victims have yet to receive compensation and which has not led to anyone serving prison time.
Sir Stephen Timms MP, chair of the work and pensions committee, said he was launching an inquiry into how watchdogs and prosecutors handled the case, in which £10m of pension savings disappeared after being invested in the heritage brand Norton Motorcycles.
Continue reading...Shopkeepers complain the number of thefts from stores is soaring. Is the cost of living crisis to blame or organised gangs?
It could be laundry tablets, lipstick or even baby milk. According to shopkeepers in the UK the number of thefts is rising. The British Retail Consortium said there were 8m instances of theft from shops last year, which cost businesses nearly £1bn. The Office for National Statistics reports a 22% rise.
For shop assistants and managers it is a daily struggle, which can be costly and infuriating – but what’s behind it? The Guardian’s North of England editor, Helen Pidd, spoke to shopkeepers on one Manchester street to see how they were coping, and spent the day in a magistrates court to find out what happens when a shoplifter is caught. She explains how organised crime may be a factor behind the rise.
Continue reading...Home affairs select committee members criticise policy of working with businesses such as Vivastreet
Senior police officers have “cosied up” to “pimping websites” that allegedly allow trafficked women to be “raped multiple times a day”, MPs have said.
Dame Diana Johnson, the chair of the home affairs select committee, said it was “disgraceful” that police forces and the National Crime Agency (NCA) were engaging with businesses such as Vivastreet.
Continue reading...Investigations ongoing after body of toddler found in Ipswich on Friday morning
A man and a woman have been arrested over the “suspicious” death of a two-year-old girl. Police said they found the body of the toddler at a property in Sidegate Lane, Ipswich, Suffolk, on Friday morning.
Investigations at the property are ongoing and officers said the death was being treated as suspicious.
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