Blackmail bungler is jailed
TWO YEARS FOR THREAT AGAINST SECURITY FIRM STAFF
G4S blackmail bungler Daniel Garland was today behind bars for his £1m extortion plot against the security giant.
As he was locked up for two years, the 20-year-old issued an apology for threatening to blow up vans and demanding the fortune from the firm.
Garland caused work to halt at the cash-handling depot in Thornaby, Teesside, when he posted a chilling note in January saying he had planted remotely controlled “mini-bombs” on vehicles.
More than 100 police officers joined a major inquiry across four force areas, cash-in-transit vans were recalled to the depots to be searched and the security giant’s losses were put at £15,000.
The police operation was estimated to have cost a further £35,000.
Garland, from Durham Place, Chester-le-Street, County Durham, had admitted a bomb hoax charge and was convicted after a trial of a blackmail offence.
Before he was sentenced to two years in a Young Offenders’ Institution, Garland read out a letter via a videolink from prison.
Garland said: “I would like to express my heartfelt apologies to the Crown, members of G4S, the police and any individuals that might have been affected by my mindless and thoughtless actions.”
Sentencing at Durham Crown Court, Recorder Euan Duff said: “We live in an age when bombs which can kill or maim are sadly a feature of modern life in the UK.
“No bomb threat can be taken lightly.”
The judge accepted Garland never truly intended to make £1m from the letter, but said his intention was to get two colleagues into trouble.
The anonymous letter, which Garland took pains not to touch without gloves, said the two were involved in an earlier, unsolved robbery on a cash-in-transit van.
Garland claimed during his trial that he had been bullied by them at work and was seeking some sort of sick revenge, but the judge dismissed that claimed.
Garland had maintained he believed they might lose their jobs as a result of his plot.
Nicole Horton, defending, said he was immature and naive.
She said: “This was a badly-thought-out piece of revenge, clearly he never intended to make himself a financial gain.”
He has been on remand since he was convicted of blackmail and Miss Norton said: “Daniel has had the shock of his life in going into prison and has found it an extremely distressing experience.”
At the trial, the jury was told how branch manager Dean Jeffels was terrified when he read the letter, which said robbers would storm the depot with weapons if £1m was not loaded on to a truck the next day.
It also warned of visiting a mother and her newborn baby while her partner - a G4S employee - was at work.