Taxi robber Jabar Ali, jailed for three years A robber who threatened a taxi driver and held a weapon to his neck has been jailed for three years.
Leeds Crown Court heard the victim Faisal Mahmood was terrified believing it was a knife when Jabar Ali told him “Give me the money or I’ll cut your throat.”
Ali had requested to be taken to Mirfield after he got into the taxi in Dewsbury High Street around 11pm on January 11 this year but then asked the driver to stop in Thornhill Road.
Duncan Ritchie prosecuting said Ali reached over and put one hand over the driver’s eyes and held something to his throat in the other.
He tried to push his passenger’s hand away getting cut on the middle finger of his right hand in the struggle. As that began to bleed he feared his throat might be cut and handed over £70 from his jacket pocket.
The next day Ali, a textile factory worker handed himself in at Dewsbury police station saying he felt guilty and ashamed of what he had done.
He said the attack had been “a cry for help” because of his heroin addiction. He said he had initially intended to smash a window and get himself arrested because he knew something had to be done.
Franklin Zakers representing him said Ali was using up to £40 worth of the Class A drug a day which was severely impacting on his family.
“It is clear that this was a desperate and in some respects rather ridiculous way of crying out for help but he says he was at that time in a very dark place.”
He said Ali wanted to apologise to his victim, it was not a knife but a silver painted stick he had used to threaten and the cut to the finger was caused by Ali’s sharp nails.
Ali, 40 of Ravens Avenue, Dewsbury admitted robbery. Jailing him Recorder Tony Kelbrick said he accepted he had given himself up to the police but it was notable he had not returned the money he had taken from the taxi driver.
source:
http://www.examiner.co.uk/news/west-yor ... d-10832099
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