Post office armed raid trio jailed

Three men have been jailed for the daylight armed robbery of a post office in which they stole nearly £16,000.

Roger Jacob, who has been postmaster of Hinton Charterhouse for 34 years since he was 18, was threatened with a machete in the heist on September 23, 2016.

Leroy Harding, 31, Luke Watts, 32, and Kristof Vanyai-white, 28, all admitted one count of armed robbery and were jailed for a total of 19 years at Bristol Crown Court on Friday. The trio have a total of 79 convictions on their records for 197 offences, the court heard.

Harding, who has committed 83 crimes, is serving a separate prison sentence with 18 months left to run for drug offences.

James Ward, prosecuting, said the raid took place at about 12.20pm

when Mr jacob was confronted by Vanyai-white holding a machete 14 inches long by three inches wide.

He said: “Mr Vanyai-white calmly told the postmaster, ‘You won’t get hurt as long as you don’t touch anything. Where’s the safe?’

“Mr Jacob said he was frightened and took the men to the safe. He opened the safe while Watts and Harding emptied it.” Watts then took £500 from the till and some new and old-style £5 notes.

The three men rushed out into a car while Mr Jacob hit panic alarms, the court heard. The total amount stolen was £15,985.73.

Hinton Charterhouse Post Office was described by Mr Ward as “a classic village post office”. “There are no screens for protection. It’s a small place and carries out the function of the village shop,” he said.

Mr Ward said the landlord of the Rose and Crown pub, opposite the post office, “thought it was strange that the door was shut”. He walked over and, as he went in, was met

with a man holding a machete. The landlord made a note of the getaway car’s registration number.

The robbers climbed into a taxi at an area know as the Frome Flyer, which took them to where they lived in Combe Down, Mr Ward said.

However, the taxi driver was suspicious because of the conversations the men were having. He later

played a key role in their arrest and conviction.

In the days after the robbery, police officers began a search of the area of the Frome Flyer.

A Ford Ka – which had been stolen during the burglary of a home in Midsomer Norton and was used as the getaway vehicle – was found by a field on Whitechapel Lane.

In the boot were tools that had come from a van that was stolen at the same time as the Ford Ka.

All three men were arrested within a week of the robbery and searches of their homes yielded bags of cash.

Vanyai-white, of Midsomer Norton, had 24 convictions for 42 offences – including damage, burglary and theft. He was also jailed for four years for a previous robbery.

Harding, of Oldfield Park, Bath, had 23 convictions for 83 offences.

These included driving offences, theft, aggravated vehicle taking, nuisance crime, burglary and theft.

Watts, of Combe Down, had 32 convictions for 72 offences, including wounding, aggravated vehicle taking and assaulting the police.

Vanyai-white was sentenced to eight-and-a-half years in jail, Harding five years and four months and Watts four years and nine months.