Man who drove stolen van for £150 is jailed
HE SAID HE WAS OFFERED JOB WHILE OUT WALKING IN THE MOUNTAINS
AMAN driving a stolen van in Snowdonia had a second stolen vehicle inside – but told police he had no idea it was in there.
Daniel Marshall claimed he was doing some mountain walking in the area with friends last month when someone offered him £150 to drive the van to Bala.
Following his arrest, he told officers he had not looked in the back of the van until he was stopped by police on the A470 near Dinas Mawddwy.
The 33-year-old, of Knowles Lane in Bradford, was disqualified from driving at the time and had no insurance, Caernarfon Crown Court heard last Tuesday.
Marshall later admitted two offences of handling stolen goods, cloning a number plate, driving while disqualified and driving with no insurance.
Judge Timothy Petts jailed the defendant, who wasn’t present in court last Tuesday due to “coronavirus difficulties”, for 60 weeks.
He was also banned from driving for another five years.
Prosecutor Oliver King said on September 22, Mohamed Patel, the owner of a Mercedes Sprinter van, had parked it down the road from his home in Bradford.
When he returned the following morning, the van was gone.
Just over two weeks later, on October 9, North Wales Police saw a similar van in a layby on the A470 near Dinas Mawddwy.
The van was searched and an “agricultural vehicle” was found inside, registered to a man called Richard Williams.
“It was so recently stolen, the owner didn’t even know it had gone,” Judge Petts said.
Further enquiries revealed the false number plates being used on the van had been cloned, and were originally registered to another van that was registered to a company in Preston.
The original number plates were found inside the van, the court heard.
Mr King said the defendant had a “large number” of previous motoring convictions, a conviction for a dwelling burglary, two for dangerous driving and four for driving while disqualified.
Defence counsel Dafydd Roberts said he conceded the matter passed the custody threshold and that an immediate custodial sentence was “inevitable”. He asked the judge to take into account that all the goods were recovered shortly after and returned to their owners.
Mr Roberts accepted his client had relevant previous convictions, but said there had been a period of six years from 2012 when Marshall did not offend.
However, he acknowledged since 2018 that his client had regularly been appearing back before the court, but said it came down to a “series of bad decisions”.