Taxi Driver Online

Jail for bailed Leeds taxi robber who punched his own grandmother

A thug slapped and punched his terrified 73-year-old grandmother while he was on police bail for robbing a taxi driver of his cab. Lee Gair, 20, and three accomplices in the South Leeds taxi driver robbery were yesterday locked up for more than nine years.

Leeds Crown Court heard the four – who were all drunk after being picked up from a party – left taxi driver Mohammed Barber too scared to carry on working at night after he was threatened with a brick and his taxi, £140 cash and mobile phone, were stolen. Gair was arrested and bailed after the robbery in the early hours of February 26.

Prosecutor, Simon Batiste said Eileen Gair had agreed to let Gair stay at her home while he was on bail. But late on March 10, Gair came home drunk and started demanding cash from his grandmother so he could buy more booze.

Mr Batiste said: “When she refused he started slapping her in the face with both hands and punched her to the left side of her body.” After she fled to the bathroom and locked the door, Gair punched holes in the bathroom door. Eileen Gair was treated in hospital for internal bruising.

When he was arrested the following morning, Gair, who has a string of previous convictions for robbery and burglary, told police he’d drunk half a full bottle and two small bottles of vodka and couldn’t remember the assault.

Mr Batiste said taxi driver Mr Barber picked Gair and three others up from an address in Winrose Hill just after 3am on November 26. In the taxi were Gair, of Lupton Street, Hunslet; Morgan Simpson, 17, of Hemingway Close, Hunslet; Eddie Carver, 18, of The Clearings Belle Isle and Andrew Ashwell, 31, of Colwyn Terrace, Beeston.

They asked to go to a Murco petrol station on Low Road Hunslet, where Gair threw a three litre bottle of cider at a shop assistant, hitting him in the head.

The robbery happened after Mr Barber was dropping the men off at the Clearings Estate in Belle Isle and asked for his £12 fare. The court heard Mr Barber lost a total of £3,345, including damage to his cab, which was later traced by police. All four defendants admitted robbery.

Gair also admitted two assaults and one criminal damage charge. Judge Kerry MacGill jailed Gair for three and a half years and Ashwell for two years and eight months.

Carver and Simpson were sent to a Young Offenders Institution for two years and 18 months respectively. Judge Macgill lifted reporting restrictions on identifying 17-year-old Simpson.

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