Gangsters' jail terms ruled 'unduly lenient' and extended

The court of Appeal yesterday increased the prison sentences imposed on four senior members of a gang for drug and gun crime.

Lord Goldsmith QC, the Attorney General, had argued in a hearing before three judges in London that jail terms handed out to members of Manchester's Pitt Bull Crew were "unduly lenient".

Lord Justice Kennedy, Mr Justice McCombe and Mr Justice Crane agreed with the Attorney General in four of the nine cases theyreviewed. Although they agreed that sentences given in five further cases were lenient, they ruled they were not unduly lenient.

The Attorney General had asked the judges to increase the levels of nine sentences imposed at Preston Crown Court last year, ranging from between four and a half and nine years.

The sentences were for offences of conspiracy to possess firearms and ammunition with intent and conspiracy to supply controlled drugs.

At the Court of Appeal yesterday, Michael Gordon, 21, had his sentence of nine years' detention increased to 12 years; Mark Simons, 23, had a seven-and-a-half-year jail term increased to 12 years; Douglas Thorne, 26, had an eight-year sentence increased to 12 years and Moses Boakye, 22, had an eight-year sentence increased to 10 years.

The judges said that the sentences would have been higher, but the court had to consider the element of double jeopardy, when an offender faces sentencing twice.

The Pitt Bull Crew controlled the heroin, cocaine and cannabis market in the Longsight area of the city. Their leader, Thomas Pitt, was jailed for life in January last year.

Lord Goldsmith told the judges: "Much of the country has only recently become aware of the fact and horrors of escalating gun crime in this country ... The use of firearms, especially by gangs, has become a serious policing issue."