Trio led police on high speed chase through Penrith while hurling items from Vauxhall Insignia
Three men led police on a chase near Penrith while hurling items from the window of their speeding car.
Grant Bower, 30, Thomas Jason Law, 29, and 26-year-old Carlton Jack Watson have now admitted to an offence of going equipped for theft.
Carlisle Magistrates’ Court was told how two constables were on patrol on the A6 near the town just after midnight on 9 December 2020.
They were aware of previous incidents in which the curtain sides of HGVs had been slashed while parked in laybys, with items stolen from them.
The officers spotted a Vauxhall Insignia parked with its lights on behind an HGV with a curtain-sided trailer. As they pulled up, the Vauxhall drove off at speed. Items were seen to be thrown from the vehicle.
Police activated blue lights and sirens but the Vauxhall driver failed to stop.
“It travelled through Penrith at very high speed,” said prosecutor Pam Ward.
Other police officers helped to halt the vehicle, which contained four men.
Pairs of gloves were recovered during a search of the car, which was fitted with number plates covered in a film coating in a bid to avoid being caught on camera.
An angle grinder and phone were found in the Inglewood Road area on the outskirts of Penrith having been hurled from the moving Vauxhall during the incident, the court heard.
At the magistrates’ court on Tuesday 4 October, Bower, Law and Watson admitted a charge of going equipped for theft with the gloves, angle grinder and the film-covered plates.
Magistrates said the case fell outside their jurisdiction and committed it to Carlisle Crown Court for sentencing.
Bower, of Radulf Gardens, Liversedge; Law, of Peel Street, Heckmondwike; and Watson, of Millers Croft, Batley, all Kirklees, West Yorkshire, are due to appear in front of a judge on Tuesday 1 November. They were granted unconditional bail until that hearing.
The court heard Bower and Law had received suspended sentences from a judge at Carlisle Crown Court in February this year after admitting going equipped for theft in March 2020.
The pair had been in a car travelling at around 90mph during a police pursuit on the A66 between Penrith and Appleby at around midnight.
On that occasion, gloves, an angle grinder and a phone had been tossed from the vehicle during the chase which was ended when a stinger was deployed.
Magistrates adjourned the case of a fourth man charged with going equipped for theft in December 2020 until later this month.
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