Birmingham Post

Mechanic stripped stolen Land Rovers

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A MECHANIC who stripped parts Now he has been ordered to from Land Rovers stolen by travelrepa­y more than £39,000 under the lers is facing a bill for nearly Proceeds of Crime Act. £40,000. The original hearing, at Warwick

Ian Turner told a court he was Crown Court, heard that Turner pressurise­d into working on the told police he knowingly bought 4x4s and was attacked on one stolen vehicles, mainly Land Rovoccasio­n. ers, from the “travelling community”.Partsfrom1­5LandRover­s,a Range Rover Evoque, Audi RS4, a In a second interview he Ford Fiesta and a motorbike were changed his story, saying he was found at his rented workshop at a working for them, rather than buyfarm in Claverdon, Warwickshi­re. ing the vehicles, and had felt under

Police raided the site after folpressur­e to break up ones they lowing a tracker fitted inside a brought to the farm. Land Rover Discovery, which was Jonathan Coode, stolen in Moseley in September said: “This is not a last year. car-ringing activity.

Turner, 50, of Jubilee Avenue, “What happened is that the travReddit­ch, was handed a two-year elling people would steal a car and suspended prison sentence in July, bring it to the workshop. after admitting converting criminal “There was a considerab­le property. amount of coercion, and the defending, convention­al defendant was on one occasion assaulted. His wife advised him to give up the enterprise and move away from the farm, but they kept coming.

“It was a combinatio­n of carrot and stick, being offered the opportunit­y to purchase vehicles of reasonably high value for a few hundred pounds, but also an element of intimidati­on.

“I concede he was a vital cog, no pun intended, but he was not the driving force.”

Sentencing Turner, Judge Sylvia de Bertodano had told him: “I don’t know how it started, but the fact is you kept going for over a year, providing for these people a valuable service.

“I accept it was not your operation, and it was not your idea, but you played an essential part.”

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