Canterbury Crown Court Sentencing Results

Loui Allman, 33, of St Eanswythe Way, was walking along Sandgate Road towards the town centre in the early hours of Saturday 21 August 2021 when he began to shout and verbally abuse a group of people he had crossed paths with. When one of the men spoke back, Allman produced a knife and stabbed him twice in the side of his body, piercing his lung. The victim, in his 20s, was airlifted to a London hospital. Allman fled the scene but was quickly identified and arrested by Kent Police later that day.

On the evening of 29 August 2020, Marain Macovei and Lulian-Ioan Stratulat were stopped at UK border controls in Coquelles, France, driving a Renault Trafic van. They claimed to be heading to London for a day trip transporting post and beer. Stratulat had an encrypted mobile phone and told officers about the cargo. Border Force found taped packages hidden behind plastic panels containing approximately 39 kilograms of cocaine, valued at £3 million at street level.

On Sunday 23 August 2020, Macauley Skirrow’s vehicle collided with a motorbike being ridden along Sutton Road in Deal after he overtook another vehicle waiting at the crossroads with Mongeham Road and Sutton Road. Skirrow did not stop at the crossroad. The motorcyclist, a man in his 70s, died at the scene. Skirrow was arrested at the scene and charged with causing death by dangerous driving, causing death by driving a vehicle while unlicensed and uninsured.

Maksims Seluks was part of a trio linked to the thefts of 29 vehicles from Ashford, Hawkinge, Tonbridge, Tenterden and Maidstone in October and November 2022. They used an electronic device to capture signals emitted by car keys and trick vehicles into thinking keys were present. The thieves travelled from east London in vehicles with cloned number plates, targeting BMWs, Mercedes and Range Rovers in Kent, which were then driven to Essex and London to be stripped and sold for parts. Seluks was arrested on 8 December 2022 near Sittingbourne along with Satas.

Kuci was involved in the drug gang that dealt cocaine across Tunbridge Wells and Tonbridge, using a dedicated phone line to take orders from customers.

Clover contacted a girl who was 12 at the time in 2019, sent her sexual messages and encouraged her to engage in sexual activity. Separate messages showed him sending similar messages to a girl he believed to be 14. He was arrested at his home in July 2020 and his mobile phone was seized and analysed.

On the evening of 29 August 2020, Macovei and Lulian-Ioan Stratulat were stopped at UK border controls in Coquelles, France, driving a Renault Trafic van. They claimed to be heading to London for a day trip transporting post and beer. Stratulat had an encrypted mobile phone. Border Force found taped packages hidden behind plastic panels containing approximately 39 kilograms of cocaine, valued at £3 million at street level.

Marcus James, 64, and the victim both lived in the Bouverie Road area of Folkestone and had previously had a disagreement about him playing loud music at his flat. On 15 August 2020, James shouted threats from near her flat and repeatedly made racially-aggravated remarks. A week later, James was again heard near the victim’s flat shouting that he had paid someone to kill her. The day after that, he made further threats. After the incidents were reported to Kent Police, James was arrested on 25 August that year and bailed with conditions not to contact the victim, pending further enquiries. However, within hours of being released, the victim again heard him near her flat, shouting threats, abuse and claiming he could see her. Police attended and arrested James for a second time and he was later charged.

Margaret Rigby, formerly of Coventry and latterly of Burnt Barn Cottages, Betteshanger, Kent, swindled her 'friend' of 40 years, the victim, out of £57,000 savings while holding power of attorney as the victim suffered from dementia and lay seriously ill in a care home. The money financed a lavish lifestyle including two cars, a caravan, a holiday to America, expensive family gifts, Take That concert tickets, clearing credit card bills, expensive meals, dental treatment for her daughter, a cooker, a £500 coffee machine, and a 'chicken house'.

Lee Owen and Liam Scott targeted small businesses and a charity in Faversham and east Kent with 12 break-ins and one attempt between November 2021 and January 2022. Incidents included: Church Street, Whitstable on 11 November 2021 (cash stolen); Seasalter on 20 December 2021 (cash, speakers, headphones stolen); two businesses in Jubilee Way, Faversham and attempted third on 1 January 2022 (cash stolen); two businesses in Herne Bay on 5 January 2022; businesses in Aylesham, Ash, and a takeaway and charity in Faversham later that month. Identified via CCTV and linked by clothing after arrests in February.

Lucasz Dabrowski, a 27-year-old labourer, damaged his employer's Grade II-listed home and car in Margate, Kent in May 2026 during a dispute over docked wages. On 4 May, CCTV showed him using a claw hammer to smash front bay windows, throwing a traffic cone through another window, and then using the traffic cone to smash the windows of his employer's Hyundai i800. The damage totalled more than £14,000. Three days earlier, police were called after Dabrowski smashed sash windows from inside the house and threw items out, causing about £5,000 of damage. The court heard he became angry after money was deducted from his wages to cover rent and later told probation officials he had 'lost the plot'.

Between September and October 2020, Lucretia Stanescu, 29, from Dagenham, committed 14 theft offences against shop staff in Dover, Whitstable, Canterbury, Maidstone, Hoo and Gillingham, as well as individual offences in Grays (Essex) and Warwick (Warwickshire). The investigation started after she stole jewellery worth £100,000 from a shop in Tenterden High Street, using a guitar to obscure her actions and captured on CCTV leaving in a red Peugeot, which was stopped by police in Berkshire three days later. She used a consistent modus operandi of distracting staff with questions while discreetly stealing valuable items like phones and jewellery, often captured on CCTV.

John Reading and Levi Smith attacked a man following an argument at the bar in a pub on Church Road, Willesborough, Ashford on 15 August 2019. The victim had entered the pub for a pool tournament but was approached by Reading and Smith, who began an argument. They followed him as he tried to leave; Smith punched him in the face, Reading repeatedly hit him, knocking him down. The victim was punched, kicked in the face, put in a chokehold, and Reading dropped a fire extinguisher on his back. Smith was arrested on 9 September 2019.

Lewis Day, 26, of Ramsgate, and Daryl Brown took part in a brutal attack at Whitstable railway station on the night of 16 December 2023. The victim, a man in his 50s, intervened in a dispute involving Day, Brown, and a friend, leading to a confrontation where the victim was chased and repeatedly stabbed in a nearby alleyway.

Mark Moys attacked his girlfriend in her home after a heated argument. He punched and choked her, bit her forearm, whipped her face with a belt, and slashed her with a Stanley knife, causing serious injuries. He was arrested on 28 April 2018. He pleaded guilty to assault, unlawful wounding, and making threats to kill.

Martin Harrison, 48, of Walsall, used an instant messaging app in October 2019 to send explicit messages to who he believed was a 12-year-old girl, actually an undercover officer from ERSOU. Despite knowing her age, he encouraged her to meet for sex and arranged to meet in Dover town centre on 20 October 2019 before travelling to France. He was arrested by Kent Police officers.

Matthew Sales, along with Thomas Pearson and Jed Coates, attacked the victim with a kitchen knife, a chain and a wooden bat in Cheriton Road, Folkestone, at around 11.50am on 25 August 2020. Sales stabbed the victim in the leg with a kitchen knife. Two days earlier, on 23 August 2020, Sales had punched the victim and stabbed him with a screwdriver. The victim was taken to hospital with stab wounds requiring long-term treatment. The attack was witnessed by members of the public, including a young girl.

Matthew Lockwood, a 47-year-old Chatham sex offender, used social media apps including Snapchat and Grindr to target and manipulate teenage boys as young as 13 by offering money. He groomed and abused at least four children during a campaign of abuse between 2016 and 2023. He was arrested in February 2023. He also admitted offences relating to the possession and distribution of thousands of illegal images of children, many in the most serious category and which included videos of some of the victims he had contact with.

Aliaj led a Class A drug ring that supplied cocaine across Tunbridge Wells and Tonbridge from May to October 2018. The gang used a London-based mobile phone to take orders 24/7, dispatching local dealers to deliver £40 bags of cocaine.

Moyazzam Hossain stalked a woman who had moved to multiple women's shelters to escape his behaviour, including one in Dover. Kent Police were contacted in January 2022 after he was seen looking for her at the Dover shelter. He had previously approached her in the street and his vehicle was seen in Thanet. He was arrested in Dover on the same day.

National Crime Agency officers arrested 28-year-old Macedonian national Muhamed Alievski in Ashford, Kent, as part of an intelligence-led operation on 5 August this year. In the back of his lorry they found a 22-year-old Albanian man who was wanted for breaching a court order after being convicted of drug offences.

Naomi Roberts, George Roberts and Frederick Lamb assaulted an 18-year-old victim in the Sturry Road area of Canterbury near Brymore Road on 7 February 2019 following a dispute. Naomi Roberts grabbed the victim by the hair, took a knife from George Roberts and stabbed her in the calf. The victim also suffered a wound to her hand while defending herself.

Miodrag Ivankovic, 45, from Banja Luka in north Bosnia, was stopped by Border Force officers on 6 September at the freight controls in Dover after arriving from Calais. Officers searched his truck and found 94kg of cocaine with a street value of £7.5m hidden in a suspicious pallet of boxes.