Taxi Driver Online

UK Newsquest Regional Press - This is Hertfordshire

July 12, 2006 Wednesday

HEADLINE: Face-slash man jailed

BYLINE: Alex Lewis

DATELINE: St. Albans Observer

A VIOLENT robber who left a taxi driver's face covered in bloody slash wounds has been jailed indefinitely and his accomplice given a five-year sentence.

Judge Joseph Gosschalk ruled Richard Harper, 34, of Elliott Close, Welwyn Garden City, was likely to re-offend and should be imprisoned until the Parole Board is satisfied he is no longer a risk to the public. He told him: "You chose a vulnerable victim who provided a useful service to the public.

"Cab drivers are entitled to be protected by the law. "This was a planned and premeditated course of conduct."

Helped by 55-year-old David Williams of Marsden Green, Harper forced Stephen Kossoff to hand over his £60 takings by repeatedly slashing him across the face with a home-made dagger, after squirting ammonia in his eyes. The pair, who called their victim to Rollswood in the early hours of May 12 last year, directed him to a quiet cul-de-sac nearby before launching their vicious attack.

Mr Kossoff fought back with a screwdriver, but eventually let them run off with his cash after Harper cut him near his eye. The robbers, who left fingerprints on the taxi, were convicted by a St Albans Crown Court jury last month.

Harper is already serving a two-and-a-half year sentence for an unrelated attack, also using ammonia and a home-made dagger, carried out later the same day in Hatfield, for which he pleaded guilty to unlawful wounding. His other previous convictions include one arson and four assaults causing actual bodlily harm. Defending him, Charles Judge said the previous assaults were relatively minor and that his client had sought help to address his violent tendencies from a prison psychiatrist.

But Judge Gosschalk said there was a pattern of escalating violence and that without the danger of re-offending he would have imposed a seven-year sentence. Williams' barrister Jonathon Penn pointed out that his ten previous convictions included none for violence, apart from a 1974 firearms offence, and said he cared for his elderly parents and an infirm aunt. Judge Gosschalk accepted Williams had played a lesser role, although he had hit Mr Kossoff and rubbed the ammonia in his eyes, and said an indeterminate sentence was not necessary.
...............................................

I quite like the indefinitely bit.

_________________
IDFIMH