‘Lawless’ youths are locked up
‘Tooled-up’ pair sent to prison
TWO young men were wandering the streets of Carmarthen “tooled-up and looking for trouble”, a court has heard.
Luke Stephen Jack Steele and his “sidekick” Graham Scott Phoenix Evans were involved in a late-night confrontation in Carmarthen, using an extendable police-style baton in the brawl.
TWO young men were wandering the streets of Carmarthen “tooled-up and looking for trouble”, a court has heard.
Luke Stephen Jack Steele and his “sidekick” Graham Scott Phoenix Evans were involved in a late night confrontation in Carmarthen, using an extendable police-style baton in the brawl.
Incredibly Steele was being investigated at the time for two separate allegations of inflicting grievous bodily harm and one of possessing a knife stretching back almost two years - offences also committed in the town centre.
Sending them both down, a judge said the case highlighted the need for police to investigate matters speedily, and get offenders to court in good time.
Swansea Crown Court heard the disturbance Steele and Evans were part of happened in Carmarthen town centre on January 18 this year.
Paul Hobson said the 20-year-olds confronted a group of people in a car park, and at various times during the brawl both defendants had been in possession of a weapon - an extendable baton.
Steele and Evans were arrested later the same night at an address in the town, but the baton itself has never been recovered.
For Steele, the January incident was the culmination of a string of violent late-night offences in Carmarthen.
Mr Hobson said the first incident saw Steele punching a man to the face outside the Savannah’s nightclub in the early hours of March 4, 2018. The punch caused a “blow out” of the victim’s right eye socket, and he later had to undergo surgery to repair the damage.
The court heard the victim named Steele as the man who had attacked him after going through Facebook posts and pictures of people who had been out in the town centre on the night in question.
The defendant was arrested the following month, interviewed, and released under investigation - but it was not until March 2019 that a formal identification process took place, and not until January 2020 that Steele was charged with inflicting grievous bodily harm. In the meantime, the defendant had pulled a knife on a group of people in the town centre, and then gone on to punch another man to the ground and leave him with bleeding on the brain.
The prosecutor said the weapon offence took place on September 11, 2019, when Steele produced a kitchen knife - said to have had a blade of between six and eight inches - and brandished it at a group of young men outside the Carmarthen branch of M&S after getting into a “slanging match” with one of their number.
Mr Hobson said the second assault happened on New Year’s Eve last year while Steele was out with his girlfriend in the town centre - the defendant punched his victim to the floor and could then be seen walking away “bouncing” and “appearing very pleased with himself”. The victim of this attack suffered a bleed on the brain.
Steele, of Cross Street, Whitland, had previously pleaded guilty to two counts of inflicting grievous bodily harm (GBH), two counts of possession of an offensive weapon, and one of affray when he appeared in the dock via videolink for sentencing.
Evans, of Heol Meinciau, Pontyates, had previously pleaded guilty to affray and possession of an offensive weapon when he appeared along his coaccused.
The court heard Steele has a previous conviction for battery, and one for possession of knife from a court in Luton.
Evans has previous convictions for assault occasioning actual bodily harm, and common assault.
Ashanti-Jade Walton, for Steele, said at the time of the offending the defendant was struggling with alcohol and anger management issues, and his mental health was deteriorating.
She said her client was now at a “pivotal moment” of his life, and was faced with a choice of either continuing along the same path and associating with the same people, or “sorting his life out” and acquiring new skills which would allow him to lead a more productive life.
The barrister said Steele had been attending an anger management course while in Swansea prison, was working in the jail’s tailors, and “has indicated that he wants to follow the latter” of the two choices she had described.
Dyfed Thomas, for Evans, said his client had a two-year-old son, was a trained scaffolder, and was “emphatic” that the period he had spent in prison on remand awaiting sentence would be his first and last taste of custody.
Judge Geraint Walters said he had no doubt the people of Carmarthen would have been relieved when the pair were locked up on remand.
Addressing the defendants he said: “You are very nearly 21 years of age - you are not children. The evidence shows you were spending your time wandering the streets of Carmarthen tooled-up and looking for trouble.
“You are feral, lawless youths. The public are rightly fed-up with people like you.”
Turning to the defendants individually, the judge said Steele had been responsible for an “orgy of violence” since March 2018, while Evans had been his “sidekick” on the night of the Carmarthen affray.
Giving the defendants credit for their guilty pleas, the judge sentenced each man to 12 months detention for the affray and baton offences. Steele was also sentenced to 12 months for the first GBH, six months for possession of a knife, and six months for a second GBH, while six months of a previously imposed suspended sentence were also activated - all these sentences will run consecutively with each other and with the affray sentence making an overall sentence in his case of 42 months.
The judge added it was “incumbent upon those who investigate lawless young men to bring them to court as quickly as possible” in order to avoid additional people becoming victims.