East Lancs robbery gang jailed for more than 50 years (From This Is Lancashire)

East Lancs robbery gang jailed for more than 50 years

5:11pm Friday 14th May 2010 in News By Sam Chadderton, Reporter

A FIVE-strong gang of robbers who planned and carried out two raids on cash-in-transit delivery vans have been given a total of at least 50 years in jail.

A security guard was shot in the leg during an armed robbery in Cherry Tree, Blackburn and the gang also got away with £50,000 in another robbery in Thornton Cleveleys.

Dean Farrell, 23, of Billinge Avenue, Blackburn, was branded 'dangerous' and 'merciless' by Judge Robert Brown and given an indeterminate sentence for public protection, with a minimum of 11 years and three months.

He had been convicted of conspiracy to commit robbery, wounding with intent and posession of a firearm, and the judge commented on the 'deliberate manner' in which he pointed the gun and pulled the trigger at Loomis employee Imran Aslam three times.

David Evans, 20, of Bonsall Street, Blackburn, was jailed for 10 years for conspiracy to commit robbery and possession of a firearm.

He was with Farrell during the Blackburn robbery.

Inside agent Simon Ginn, 29, of Water Street, Accrington, got 12 years for two counts of conspiracy to commit robbery.

Organiser Colin McCash, 32, of Spencer Street, Accrington, got 10 years for two counts of conspiracy to commit robbery.

Jimmy Mulholland, 37, of Windermere Avenue, Accrington, got seven-and-a-half years for conspiracy to commit robbery.

The shot security guard Imran Aslam was in court to see the gang sentenced, but declined to speak after the hearing.

Prosecutor Hugh McKee explained that lifelong friends McCash and Ginn hatched the plot in a pub after a game of football.

Mark Stuart, for McCash, said the keen amateur boxer and footballer played in the same team and went to the same gym as Ginn.

He said: “It worked well once so they decided to do it again.”

A letter from Dean Farrell's three aunts to the judge blamed McCash for getting the 23-year-old involved.

But Judge Brown said Farrell, who had no previous convictions, 'was involved in the planning' of the Blackburn robbery.

McCash had served in the Army and been honourably discharged before finding work as a double glazing fitter, but had declined into crime.

He had 28 convictions for drugs, driving, violence and handling stolen goods.

It was his job to recruit the foot soldiers to carry out his and Ginn's plan.

Ginn penned a letter to the judge expressing his remorse and claiming he 'would never knowingly have put one of his colleagues at risk of injury'.

The debt-ridden former soldier was discharged on medical grounds.

He pulled out of the Blackburn job two days before, but Judge Brown said he indirectly 'abandoned the pair of guards to their fate' and that his actions were a 'gross breach of trust'.

His barrister Richard Simons said the 29-year-old accepted his inside agent role was 'fundamental', but that he provided the information on the basis that violence was only threatened because that would 'suffice'.

“Plainly that went to plan in the first offence and in spite of the success of that, he withdrew his consent prior to the commission of the second offence.”

Kenneth Hind, for David Evans, said his client had been 19 at the time of the Blackburn robbery and had been at his partner's bedside as she gave birth to their first child while others planned the robbery.

During his time on bail he became a father for the second time and his mum suffered a stroke from the stress of the trial.

He had one previous conviction of robbery from 2006, but Mr Hind said Evans was 'not a planner' and just recruited by his pal Dean Farrell.

Timothy Ashmole, defending father of five Jimmy Mulholland, a self-employed roofer, said his client's role was limited to the driver in the Thornton Cleveleys raid.

Police will seek to recover the majority of the stolen £70,000 in a Proceeds of Crime hearing in October.