THESE criminals from across west Wales have been jailed in July.
The defendants were accused of offences including inciting people to commit arson, sexual assault, stalking, cocaine dealing, growing cannabis, and breaching a restraining order.
They have been sentenced to more than 30 years combined.
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Here’s a round-up of their cases.
Michael Arundel
Michael Arundel, 34, of Mynydd Bach in Ammanford, offered cash to people online to set fire to a home and a car, and was caught with £62,500-worth of cocaine when he was arrested.
Witnesses saw a man throw something at an Audi on Arundel’s street which “immediately exploded” on February 28. The owner of the car recognised them as being linked to Arundel.
Following this incident, officers began monitoring the Telegram app.
Arundel messaged at 7.02pm on April 26: ‘Need a house set on fire. Cash ready … Tycroes area’, before sending a picture of bags of money.
At 8.16pm, he messaged: ‘Cash was paid … that last job is sorted. Watch what happens tonight’.
After discovering the messages, Dyfed-Powys Police attended the area.
‘You can’t delay the inevitable!! It’s happening 100%’, Arundel messaged on Telegram. However no attack took place.
Three days later, officers on patrol in Llanelli spotted Arundel, who fled down Marble Hall Road. He fell over as he tried to take a plastic bag out of his pocket and discard it.
Inside the bag, officers found a half kilogram block of cocaine with a street value of up to £62,500.
Officers examining his phones found Telegram messages on February 28 relating to the first incident, as well as evidence of dealing cocaine and MDMA – both Class A drugs – and cannabis and ketamine – both Class B drugs – between August 2023 and April this year.
Arundel admitted possession with intent to supply cocaine, as well as two offences of being concerned in the supply of cocaine, MDMA, cannabis and ketamine, as well as intentionally encouraging the commission of an offence.
He was jailed for 11 years, and his victim was granted a 20-year restraining order.
Scott Cowdery
Prolific shoplifter Scott Cowdery was caught trying to conceal several wraps of cocaine when he was searched at a police station.
Cowdery, 31, of Wesley Place in Trecwn, was jailed for two years and two months for possession with intent to supply cocaine.
He admitted six offences of shoplifting – stealing alcohol, razors and groceries worth a total of £310.61 from shops in Haverfordwest and Pembroke Dock between January 31 and May 13, as well as assaulting a police officer at an address on Vine Road in Johnston on July 22 last year, and was sentenced to a total of 20 weeks at Haverfordwest Magistrates’ Court on May 21.
When busted for stealing food from the Premier Stores on Market Street in Haverfordwest on May 13, Cowdery was searched and taken to Haverfordwest Police Station.
However, his behaviour in his cell led police to conduct another search.
As this was carried out, Cowdery grabbed a plastic bag and was trying to conceal it. Inside were 13 zip lock bags, 12 of which contained white powder – later confirmed to be cocaine – whilst there was also some powder on the floor.
In total, Cowdery had 7.7 grams of cocaine on him, which had a street value of up to £600.
The defendant was on bail at the time, and was also subject to a community order.
Cowdery pleaded guilty to possession with intent to supply cocaine on the basis said he was dealing in order to fund his own habit.
Matthew Gilbert
Matthew Gilbert, 39, of Water Street in Pembroke Dock, was branded by a judge as a “significant risk” to young boys in the community as she jailed him for sexually assaulting a 17-year-old on a bus.
Gilbert boarded a bus at Pembroke Dock on the morning of September 28 last year. He headed to the back of the bus, where a 17-year-old was sat.
He sat opposite the teenager and immediately started talking to him. He asked the teenager how much money it would take for him to do a sexual act with a man, before then moving closer to him, cornering him.
He asked the teenager his age, to which he said he was 15. Gilbert replied that was fine and offered him £40 to do a sexual act with him. He then upped this to £100.
Gilbert moved next to the teenager and put his hand on his thigh, before kissing him on the cheek. He then asked him to get off the bus at Johnston with him and “find a public toilet”.
When the bus stopped, Gilbert got off, but the teenager remained on the bus and the police were called.
The defendant was arrested that day whilst visiting his mum in hospital. He told officers: “Since mum has been in here I’ve been doing stupid things again.”
Gilbert was jailed for 16 months after pleading guilty to sexual assault. He was ordered to register as a sex offender for 10 years, and was made subject to a sexual harm prevention order for the same period.
Adam Lewis
Stalker Adam Lewis, 39, of Plas Gwyn Road in Penygroes, broke into a woman’s home after she rejected him and messaged her saying he would take his own life in her bed.
Lewis was jailed for 13 months after he admitted stalking his victim over a period of weeks in May.
The victim met Lewis – who was some 11 years older than her – whilst out drinking at Tafarn-Y-Phoenix in Gorslas in early May. The two went home together, but after that he became infatuated with her and repeatedly messaged her and showed up at her house in the early hours of the morning.
The victim messaged Lewis telling him she “didn’t want things to go any further” and “was scared by his behaviour”.
At around 12.30am on May 26, Lewis showed up at her home again – however the victim wasn’t home. Lewis smashed a window – cutting his arm – and climbed inside to go and look for her. As he moved around the house, he left a trail of blood from his injured arm.
He went in to the victim’s bedroom and climbed in to her bed. There, he messaged her: ‘I’m going to die in your bed. Now that’s gangster’.
The police were called and found Lewis in the living room. He was taken to hospital for treatment, and was arrested.
He pleaded guilty to stalking involving serious alarm or distress, and his victim was granted a 10-year restraining order against him.
Martin Fitzgerald
Caravan thief Martin Fitzgerald was busted on the M4 using a fake number plate secured with hair ties after he raided a site near Tenby.
Police were called to Westlands Lane in Melksham, Wiltshire, at around 10.40pm on January 29, 2022, after the part-owner of the site spotted a car making off with a Baileys Unicorn caravan.
The police spotted Fitzgerald towing the caravan on to the M4 some 11 miles away heading towards Bristol, before going on to the M5.
He was stopped by the police and arrested. Checks showed the registration didn’t match the car, and cutting equipment was found inside.
On the afternoon of December 11 last year, the owner of Well Park Caravan Park in New Hedges reported two vehicles entering the site and a group of “six to eight” men hitching two caravans to them.
Fitzgerald drove away in a Skoda with a Coachman caravan valued at £32,000, whilst a Kia made off with a £25,000 caravan.
The defendant was stopped by the police on the M4 at a services outside Cardiff. He didn’t have a licence or insurance, and a fake number plate was attached to the Skoda using hair ties. The number plate this was covering was also fake.
Officers also found bolt cutters, jump leads, a wheel brace and towing wing mirrors, as well as another number plate.
Fitzgerald, of Kings Weston Lane in Avonmouth, pleaded guilty to theft, two offences of attempted theft, going equipped for theft, two offences of fraudulent use of a registration mark, driving whilst disqualified, and driving without insurance.
Judge Geraint Walters jailed the 60-year-old for 10 months for the Wiltshire theft, and a further 12 months for the Pembrokeshire offences. He also banned him from driving for 17 months.
Andrew Gold
Andrew Gold, 41, of no fixed abode, was described “devious and manipulative” as he was jailed for sending a picture of his penis to who he thought was a 14-year-old boy and for encouraging the ‘boy’ to masturbate.
Gold had faced a trial over allegations of attempted sexual communications with a child and attempting to incite a child to engage in sexual activity. He was found guilty of both charges on July 2.
“I’m sure there is a serious risk to young boys,” Judge Catherine Richards said as she sentenced Gold.
Gold, previously of Tenby, contacted who he thought was a 14-year-old boy named Ryan – but was actually as decoy account – between June and September last year.
The contact began on a dating app, before moving on to Snapchat. Gold sent ‘Ryan’ a picture of his penis and asked him to send pictures of himself. He also described sexual acts to ‘Ryan’ that he said he planned do with him, and encouraged ‘Ryan’ to masturbate.
Gold was also ordered to register as a sex offender for life, and was made subject to an indefinite sexual harm prevention order.
Silviu Grigore
Silviu Grigore, 35, of Llanybydder, exposed himself to his mother, spat and swore at her before assaulting and threatening to kill her.
The unemployed Romanian man would shout, swear and spit at his mother, call her a whore and demand money for alcohol. He would also expose himself to his mother and, prior to an assault on May 17, he had exposed himself and inserted a plastic bottle into his own rectum.
He blamed his mother, who he had lived with since they both moved to Llanybydder from Romania in 2021, for his lack of success in finding work.
On May 17, Grigore burst into his mother’s bedroom and making accusations and demanding money for alcohol.
He later drank four cans of alcohol and started shouting, screaming, cursing and spitting at his mother.
He made around ten threats to kill her, saying that if he went to prison he would come out and find her to kill her, and calling her a whore.
Later that evening he grabbed his mother’s clothing around her chest with both hands and shook her, again threatening to kill her.
Grigore initially denied the offences but changed his plea to guilty when the case came to crown court.
He was sentenced to 15 months in prison. The judge also imposed a five-year restraining order preventing Grigore from contacting his mother in any way.
Sergejs Zakacura
Sergejs Zakacura, 46, of India Row in Monkton, pleaded guilty to producing cannabis on the day he was due to stand trial.
Officers attended an address on India Row on February 3. There were several outbuildings on the land which had been rented out – one of which was to Zakacura.
Inside a building adjoining the outbuilding rented by the defendant, officers found a fully-equipped cannabis grow room.
A total of 150 cannabis plants were seized. These could have produced a yield with a street value of £140,000 if sold in one gram deals, the court heard.
They also found the electricity metre had been bypassed.
The defendant returned to the address whilst the police were still there. He was arrested and was interviewed the next day, and it was found he was on bail at the time.
He admitted the offence on the basis that he was acting as a gardener. This was accepted by the prosecution.
Zakacura was sentenced to three years and seven months in prison. A Proceeds of Crime Act hearing will be held on November 1.
Stephen James
Sex offender Stephen James, 52, of no fixed abode, was returned to prison after ignoring the terms of a court order.
James was previously jailed for 13 months for sexually assaulting 11-year-old girl and a six-year-old girl in Tenby town centre on September 16.
He was also ordered to register as a sex offender for 10 years and was made the subject of a sexual harm prevention order for the same period.
James had been released on licence on April 3, and moved back to Pembrokeshire, registering with Haverfordwest Police Station on May 31.
He told the officers that he would be living in a tent, and was told that, as he was homeless, he would have to return to re-register at a police station every seven days.
James failed to register with the police by June 7, and on June 12 was recalled to prison after he missed an appointment with the probation service.
A police appeal was issued on June 20, and the following day officers were told that James was living in the Tenby area.
James was arrested at around 10am near the Kiln Park Holiday Centre. He had been sleeping rough between there, the Lydstep coastal path and Tenby’s South Beach.
He told officers he was aware that he needed to register with the police, but “decided he wasn’t going to bother” and “had made a conscious decision to avoid the police”.
James pleaded guilty to breaching his notification requirements, and was jailed for eight months.
Melissa Eynon
Melissa Eynon, 32, of Hill Street in Haverfordwest, has been jailed after showing up to an appointment with the probation service whilst high.
Eynon had been spared prison when she was sentenced to 13 months and two weeks, suspended for 18 months for unlawful wounding after stabbing her now former boyfriend for using up the last of the milk.
Her partner went downstairs to make her a cup of tea on February 3, but instead made himself some cereal. When she came downstairs, she saw there was no milk left.
Eynon picked up a kitchen knife and stabbed him in the hand and then in the right forearm – with the four-inch blade lodging in his arm.
“If we all took knives to our partners for drinking too much milk, the world would be in a sorry state,” Recorder Greg Bull KC said, as he ordered Eynon to complete 150 hours of unpaid work and 20 rehabilitation activity requirement days.
The defendant breached her suspended sentence after failing to show up for appointments with the probation service on June 6 and 12.
Eynon did attend another appointment, however “it was noted that the defendant appeared to be under the influence of controlled drugs at the time”.
The defendant’s suspended sentence was activated, and Eynon will serve up to half of that in prison.
Lee Bennett
Lee Bennett, 53, of Lon Y Coed in Pontardawe, defrauded a vulnerable neighbour and breached a restraining order by turning up outside a police officer's home and making comments about her sexuality.
Bennett asked his “vulnerable” next door neighbour for her bank card and PIN to repay a £5 debt on April 2 last year. When he returned it, he gave her a £10 note.
He had removed £300 from her account at a cash machine at the Post Office in Pontardawe, and another £100 from a cash point at Tesco. He had also twice attempted to take out another £100, but wasn’t able to.
When his victim realised £400 had been removed from her account, she confronted the defendant, but he told her she “had no reason to report him to the police”.
Bennett told police he did take the money, but it wasn’t fraud as his victim had given him permission to take out £500 to buy a car. He claimed she was “confused” over the debt and “suggested somebody had been putting ideas in [her] head”.
The court heard that another woman had been granted a restraining order against Bennett on July 18 last year.
On February 3, Bennett appeared outside the victim and her partner’s home and started shouting demanding his phone back – which had been seized by police.
Bennett could then be heard making comments to a passer-by about the victims’ sexuality and their roles as police officers, before making a false claim about having a past relationship with one of the women.
He then drove off, beeping his horn repeatedly.
The police were called, and Bennett returned to the address whilst the officers were there. He was obstructive, and had to be removed from his car at Taser-point.
When he got out the car, he said: ‘When I get out, she’s having it.’
He pleaded guilty of fraud by false representation at Swansea Crown Court on May 3. He denied breaching the restraining order and two offences of use threatening, abusive, or insulting words and behaviour to cause harassment, alarm or distress, but was convicted at Swansea Magistrates’ Court.
The court heard he had already breached this restraining order twice before.
Bennett was sentenced to a total of 56 weeks in prison, and his victims were granted three-year restraining orders against him.
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