Jewellery robbers have ruined victim’s life

TWO men have been jailed for ten years each after being convicted of bursting into a house in Exeter and robbing a petrified woman of jewellery.

Samuel McGill, 36, and Robert Vipond, 38, surprised the victim as she was walking through her front door in Blackboy Road.

The masked intruders threw her on a sofa and threatened to stab her and cut off her arms if she did not give them the gold bracelets, rings and necklaces she was wearing.

The pair fled the scene with the valuables and a handbag which they later set fire to on wasteland in the Digby area of the city.

Both men denied robbery, but a jury at Exeter Crown Court took just under two hours to find them guilty. Both men are career criminals with lengthy records.

Just one week after his arrest for this offence, Vipond burgled the home of an 89-year-old woman, taking jewellery while she was out shopping.

The victim of the Blackboy Road offence said in a victim statement that her life had been ruined by the violence of two ‘evil’ men.

“Home is a place where a person should be entitled to feel at peace, however, this right has been stripped from me,” she said.

The robbery happened on July 15, 2019. The men burst into the house as the woman, who had been out to see a friend, opened the front door to get in. Her phone was knocked out of her hand and a cushion put over her face. The total value of the jewellery was about £3,000, but it held huge sentimental worth to the victim.

The victim did not know the men, but was able to tell police that at one point during the robbery the mask of the taller robber briefly slipped and she could see he had a beard. Both men were arrested in Exeter a few days later.

Simon Burns, defending Vipond, said his client had only just been released from a previous sentence when he committed the robbery. He was a drug user who had stolen to get money for his addiction.

Will Parkhill, for McGill, said he was a heroin addict. He said his long list of previous offences had been for less serious offences.

In a statement the victim said: “I was the victim of an attack in my own home... which has changed my life forever and I truly believe I will never be the same again.”