Faces of Britain’s ‘super-criminals’ who make a mockery of our courts by committing HUNDREDS of crimes including robberies, violent attacks and knife offences
ONE of Britain’s most prolific road menaces, John Moir walked free from court – despite flouting a driving ban for an incredible 44th time.
The road lout – who has more than 220 offences to his name – is among a soaring number of ‘super criminals’ making a mockery of UK courts by totting up hundreds of offences.
A shocking report last week revealed the number of convicted offenders who dodge prison despite having committed more than 50 crimes each has TRIPLED since 2007.
Last year alone, an alarming 3,916 avoided jail terms – up from 1,299 11 years earlier.
The review, by Tory MP Neil O’Brian, also found thousands of repeat knife offenders are walking free – despite ministers vowing to crack down on our country’s knife crime epidemic.
While some will have been to prison in the past, why are these ‘super prolific’ offenders allowed to walk Britain’s streets? And who are they? Below, we reveal the faces of some of the UK’s most notorious career criminals – and their horrifyingly long records…
The driving menace who nearly killed a man
Crime toll: 220
Road lout John Moir has more than 220 offences to his name, once nearly killed a pedestrian in a hit-and-run while banned, and previously boasted to police: “Going to prison won’t stop me.”
But he still walked free from court after flouting a driving ban for the 44th time.
Moir, then 47 and from Ipswich, Suffolk, was given a 16-week suspended prison sentence by a judge in 2014 after admitting driving while disqualified, driving without insurance and careless driving.
Leading road safety charity Brake later called on the Government to “get tough” with serial offenders, saying drivers like Moir who flout bans were “making a mockery of the justice system”.
Moir, who had previously been jailed for short stretches for driving while disqualified offences, nearly killed pedestrian Simon Jacobs in an Ipswich hit-and-run nine years ago after he ran a red light.
The thieving mum-of-three dubbed ‘The Magpie’
Crime toll: 218
Glamorous mum-of-three Jeanette Fidler is one of Britain’s most prolific female thieves – but that didn’t stop her walking free from court after racking up her 218th conviction.
The 46-year-old, dubbed ‘The Magpie’, began her life of crime in 2000 after she lost her job as a recruitment company manageress and became hooked on heroin.
During more than 17 years of offending, she carried out raids on ladies’ gym lockers, health centres, leisure complexes and spas across the North of England.
She is thought to have plundered tens of thousands of pounds’ worth of items in total, and ended up being banned from all UK leisure centres, gyms or hotels.
In 2017, Fidler, who had a young son at the time, admitted breaching her Criminal Behaviour Order. But despite her shocking record, she escaped jail with a 12-month community order.
The judge told her: “I’m not going to send you to prison as I think this will encourage your little boy to get involved with the kind of life you have lived.”
Fidler, of Oldham, Greater Manchester, had previously been handed short jail terms for her crime sprees – only to come back out and re-offend.
The “wild animal” who bit a woman
Crime toll: 81
Thug Robert Payne brutally attacked 28-year-old mum Gemma Black outside a Cambridge hotel in April last year.
The repeat offender – who already had 30 separate convictions for 77 offences including fraud and racially-aggravated harassment – bit and punched his victim during the violent assault.
Gemma, who has a little boy, later said how Payne, whom she knew, bit her “like a wild animal” after trapping her in a car outside the hotel in Tenison Road.
But despite his lengthy criminal record and police deeming him a “dangerous man who has shown his violent nature”, Payne was spared jail at Cambridge Crown Court.
He was instead allowed back on to Britain’s streets with a suspended two-year prison term for ABH (actual bodily harm) – reduced to 18 months for his guilty plea.
He also got two months for using threatening behaviour with intent to cause fear and one month each for two counts of theft from a shop, all also suspended.
The knifeman found with an 8in blade down his trousers
Crime toll: 90
“Super criminal” Alan Duffield had already been arrested three times for carrying knives when he was found with an eight-inch blade hidden down the front of his tracksuit bottoms in Middlesbrough.
But despite a sickeningly long record of 89 previous offences including robbery – and his four convictions for carrying a knife – he was spared jail by a judge at Teesside Crown Court in May 2012.
He was instead given a suspended nine-month jail term and ordered to do unpaid work for the community after pleading guilty to possessing a bladed article in public, according to Teesside Live.
The judge warned him he faced immediate prison if he was caught with a knife again.
Current UK laws say that anyone caught in possession of a knife for a second time – never mind a fourth – should automatically receive a six-month prison sentence.
The burglar who’s a “serious blight” on householders
Crime toll: 117
Burglar Nathan Hibberd first started offending aged 14. Since then, he has carried out more than 110 crimes, becoming “a serious blight on householders” in Britain.
But despite his litany of crime, Hibberd was spared jail by a judge after being caught red-handed stealing a chainsaw from a house in Painswick, Gloucestershire.
The 2017 robbery was his fifth burglary since the ‘third’ strike regulations were introduced in 1999 – supposedly setting a three-year minimum jail term for burglars convicted of three domestic burglaries.
Hibberd, then 43, admitted the burglary – but was given a chance by Judge Jamie Tabor QC, who instead handed him a two-year suspended jail term.
The judge told him: “We have looked across this court at each other too often.”
He added that he could see “green shoots” that suggested the burglar – who has carried out 117 offences and previously served time behind bars – was “making a real effort” to sort his life out.
The OAP who can’t stop stealing
Crime toll: 546
Shoplifter Harry Hankinson has targeted stores across the UK for nearly five decades, snatching items ranging from designer handbags and perfume to packets of meat.
But despite committing more than FIVE HUNDRED offences, the 70-year-old was incredibly spared jail by magistrates in Ashton-under-Lyne, Greater Manchester, last month.
Footie-loving Hankinson blamed his crime spree on a head injury he suffered falling from a hotel balcony while watching England on TV during the 1970 World Cup.
He said this left him with an ”uncontrollable” urge to steal.
While the OAP, from Manchester, has had spells behind bars in the past, his own wife has spoken out to condemn the short prison sentences he’s received.
In June, he appeared in the dock yet again, on crutches, after he was caught stealing £50 of food from Sainsbury’s and £85 of spirits from Aldi.
But despite admitting two charges of theft, he was conditionally discharged by JPs after claiming he usually gave away most of the items he stole.
He’s now back walking our streets, with 546 crimes to his name.
Hankinson’s defence team had claimed that medical tests indicated he suffered from “organic personality disorder” caused by brain damage.
The female shoplifter with a penchant for sports tops
Crime toll: 107
Nicola Casey was given “one last chance to prove you mean business” by magistrates after stealing three Lacoste T-shirts from JD Sports – despite carrying out more than 100 previous offences.
The prolific shoplifter, in her mid-30s, strolled into the sports shop in Hartlepool’s Middleton Grange shopping centre before leaving with the tops, magistrates heard in 2016.
The prosecutor said: “She made no attempt to pay for them.”
Casey later admitted theft and breaching a suspended sentence imposed for three previous shop thefts.
But despite having convictions for 107 offences, she was spared jail, after magistrates heard how her benefits had stopped, she’d sold the shirts to get food and she was getting her life back on track.
The period of her suspended sentence was instead extended to 12 months, the Hartlepool Mail reports.
And… the shoplifter who keeps getting short jail terms
The new report states around half of all crimes are committed by just 10% of offenders.
And as well as highlighting the number of “super-prolific” criminals who are dodging prison, the MP for Harborough has called for longer sentences for the ones who are locked up.
Serial shoplifter Robert Knowles has carried out hundreds of crimes over six decades – but has been repeatedly released back on to the country’s streets after receiving short prison sentences.
His previous terms behind bars include 16 weeks, six months and just four weeks.
Although prosecutors don’t have a comprehensive list of Knowles’s rap sheet, he has at least 271 convictions and is reported to have committed more than 340 offences.
In 2015, the then-68-year-old was jailed for five months, after being found on a park bench in Plymouth, Devon, wearing stolen clothing and with bottles of wine he’d taken from a supermarket.
Incredibly, it was his 193rd court appearance.
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The Ministry of Justice has said sentences are decided by independent judges, based on the full facts of each case, and that they are getting tougher for those carrying knives.
But Mr O’Brien has called on Britain’s next prime minister – revealed this week to be Boris Johnson – to do more to protect the public from “super criminals”.
“[Johnson] must invest in our jails and ensure that super-prolific criminals start getting the time in prison they deserve,” he says.