Judge snubs shotgun sentence pair

A JUDGE has told two burglars permanently injured when they were shot by a homeowner: “That is the chance you take”.

Judge Michael Pert, QC, jailed Joshua O’Gorman and Daniel Mansell for four years each after rejecting a plea that he take the shooting into account.

O’Gorman and Mansell, who have a string of convictions
between them, were blasted with a legally owned shotgun by Andy Ferrie as they attempted to rob his farm cottage in the early hours of 2 September.

O’Gorman, who was shot in the face, and Mansell, who was hit in his right hand, had pleaded guilty to the break-in at Welby, near Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire, at an earlier hearing.

Sentencing them at Leicester Crown Court yesterday, the judge said: “I make it plain that, in my judgment, being shot is not mitigation. If you burgle a house in the country where the householder owns a legally held shotgun, that is the chance you take. You cannot come to court and ask for a lighter sentence
because of it.”

He was responding to a mitigation plea from Andrew Frymann, representing O’Gorman, who said being shot was for his client akin to a “near-death
experience” for which he was not prepared.