Middle-class brothers went on 6-year global graffiti ‘art’ rampage
Judge labels sons of NHS boss common vandals
‘Mindless behaviour’
TWO brothers from a middle-class family have been branded ‘common vandals’ by a judge after a six-year campaign of wanton damage on trains and buildings across the world.
Dominic Leach, 25, and his brother Niall, 34, were leading figures in a group of self-styled ‘street artists’ called the SMT Crew.
They spray-painted slogans and motifs on the sides of trains, bridges and other property, blighting neighbourhoods and causing damage which cost hundreds of thousands of pounds to clean up.
The pair – whose mother Michelle is a senior NHS manager at the world-famous Christie cancer hospital in Manchester – continued their attacks despite being arrested in Italy and South Korea.
After the gang’s leader, Kieron Cummings, a talented fashion photographer, was locked up in 2012, Dominic – a computer technician – agreed to assume control, a court heard.
Cummings sent Dominic a message from prison urging him and his cricket club groundsman brother Niall not to get caught, adding: ‘I trust your judgment – I want quality pieces.’ Between 2011 and 2017, they struck hundreds of times around the world, posting footage of their ‘tagging’ attacks on social media.
Niall was seen opening a bottle of champagne in celebration outside a graffiti-hit train in Southport, Merseyside, while Dominic marketed a DVD of their activities entitled System Tumours to fans of the underground graffiti scene.
But police began rounding up the gang after Dominic was stopped and searched on the London Underground in 2013.
Officers found a trail of texts and messages implicating his SMT Crew accomplices.
Last year the brothers were jailed over a £340,000 vandalism spree but were released early for good behaviour. Just three months later they were arrested in Seoul over another graffiti attack. They were subsequently locked up in South Korea then deported back to the UK and recalled to prison.
On Wednesday, the brothers, who live in their parents’ £160,000 end-terrace house in Middleton, Greater Manchester, were each sentenced to 12 months in jail over involvement in graffiti damage costing £77,000. But the pair – who admitted conspiracy to cause criminal damage – were freed due to time spent on remand.
Judge Hilary Manley told them: ‘ You have displayed pointless, mindless, self-indulgent behaviour and have caused inconvenience and expense to many people.
‘Going around causing this kind of unsightly mess causes a lot of problems. It is just common vandalism.
‘At the age that each of you are, it should be plain embarrassing for you to be in that dock.’
Manchester Crown Court heard graffiti costs councils in England £270 million and train operators £100 million each year in paint removal. It is thought the vandalism causes 11,500 hours of train delays a year.
William Donnelly, prosecuting, described the gang’s activities as ‘a subculture with its own rules’.
‘Each graffiti writer is usually part of a group with their own tag – for a dedicated graffiti writer danger is often part of the thrill. But graffiti can also lead to the decline of an area and is a lack of respect to where people live and play. Graffiti may create no-go areas prejudicing interest in that place.’
Mr Donnelly said police found photographs and videos implicating the brothers and other members of the gang in ‘a nationwide campaign of criminal damage’.
In mitigation, defence lawyer Dan Gaskell said: ‘It is a great shame that two intelligent men find themselves in custody for an offence of this nature. But they are confident they will both find work again.’
The risks run by graffiti gangs were grimly illustrated last month when Alberto Fresneda Carrasco, 19, Harrison ScottHood, 23, and Jack Gilbert, 23, were killed by a freight train in South London.