Who has been jailed this week at Bradford Crown Court?

It includes drug dealers, a dangerous offender and a "violent" bully who unleased a horrifying attack on a woman. 

• A GREEDY ‘third strike’ drug dealer was jailed for six years and five months for persistently peddling ‘poison’ on the streets of Bradford

Tyeb Shakoor, 36, of Canterbury Avenue, Little Horton, Bradford, was spotted by the police in a Mercedes in the city centre on June 1 last year with £1,140 of cocaine with him and £910 in cash.

When pulled over and arrested, he told officers: ‘My life is over. I’m greedy. I just wanted more,’ Bradford Crown Court heard.

He declined to answer any questions when interviewed but went on to plead guilty to possession of cocaine with intent to supply.

Nicola Hoskins, prosecuting, said Shakoor had 17 previous convictions for 31 offences, including possession of heroin and cocaine with intent to supply.

This was the third time he had been caught dealing in Class A drugs, meaning he could be jailed for up to seven years.

The court heard that police officers on patrol in Bradford city centre became suspicious of the Mercedes driven by Shakoor.

They found bags of cocaine in the vehicle and a large white block of the drug, together valued at £1,140.

Drug dealing messages were found on Shakoor’s phone and he had £910 in cash on him.

Erin Kitson-Parker said in mitigation that it would be unjust to impose the minimum term.

Shakoor had run up a drug debt and been threatened. There had been a gap in his offending and he suffered with depression.

He was remorseful and had accepted full responsibility for what he had done.

Shakoor had a wife and two children and was working as a delivery driver. His parents had health problems and he had been supporting them.

He wanted to be given an opportunity to change.

He was sentenced on a video link to HMP Leeds where he was remanded.

Judge Jonathan Rose said he had no doubt that Shakoor’s imprisonment would impact on his family, just as the heroin and cocaine he had distributed and sold had helped to ruin the lives of others.

There was only person to blame for the financial difficulty faced by his wife while he was behind bars.

He had chosen on three occasions to make money by peddling ‘poison’ on the streets of Bradford.

Judge Rose said Shakoor had an appalling record and his case was aggravated by the fact that he was on licence at the time.

• A GANG of robbers smashed their way into a jeweller’s shop with a Mitsubishi Shogun to steal £5,000 worth of gold stock, Bradford Crown Court heard.

A small child had just moved away from the window when the vehicle came crashing into the premises on Leeds Road in Bradford, prosecutor Brian Russell said.

The three masked and gloved robbers grabbed trays of jewellery and when the shopkeeper tried to get one of them back, he was forcibly punched.

John Doyle, 36, who is serving a five-year jail sentence for threats to kill and possession of a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence, pleaded guilty to the robbery.

He was labelled a dangerous offender and jailed for four and a half years with a two-year extended licence period.

Mr Russell said the offence took place at 11.50am on May 14, 2019.

The victim, who ran the shop for his daughter, was getting out trays of jewellery when the Shogun arrived.

The child was inside the shop and standing at the window seconds before the vehicle reversed through it doing £4,500 worth of damage.

The three men in dark clothing ran into the shop, jumped over the counter, seized trays of jewellery and put them into a sheet.

The victim was grabbed by the collar and thrown across the counter and when he tried to retrieve a tray, he was forcibly punched by Doyle.

Doyle lost a glove in the altercation and was detected by DNA evidence on it.

The robbers left in a black Mercedes, abandoning the Shogun at the scene.

In his victim personal statement, the shopkeeper said he feared the child would be hurt.

The insurance company paid out promptly and the business had continued to operate but it was now run differently.

 ‘He has managed to crack on and shown a degree of fortitude,’ Mr Russell commented.

Doyle, who had a prison address on the court record, had since been sentenced for drugs offences as well as the firearms matter.

He had 31 previous convictions for 84 offences, including conspiracy to burgle when he was jailed for more than six years.

Khadim Al’Hassan said in mitigation that he had an increased motivation to change and was positively moving away from an offending lifestyle.

He had passed exams while serving his sentence and undertaken training to become a trusted prisoner.

Recorder Tony Watkin said it was a shocking and violent robbery when the shopkeeper was going about his usual business and the child was in the shop with him. The youngster moved away from the window just seconds before the vehicle smashed into it.

It was a carefully planned and organised robbery but although force was used, there were no weapons.

The recorder ruled that Doyle was a dangerous offender at a high risk of causing serious harm to the public.

He was given a six and a half year extended prison sentence, made up of a four and a half year custodial term plus two years of extended licence.

Doyle will serve two thirds of the jail term behind bars before he can be considered for release by the Parole Board.

• THREE men were sentenced for their roles in a targeted £32,000 theft from a lorry parked outside Bradford’s Euroway Industrial Estate.

They wore high visibility vests to unload boxes of conditioner from the vehicle on Wharfedale Road while the driver was asleep in the cab, Bradford Crown Court heard.

The police were quickly on the scene just after midnight on December 14, 2021, and all three were apprehended, prosecutor Gerald Hendron said.

Richard Lawn, 39, of Balm Place, Holbeck, Leeds; Jacob Cross, 28, of Throstle Terrace, Middleton, Leeds; and Ellis Burgham, 21, of Gilpin Terrace, Upper Wortley, Leeds, all pleaded guilty to theft.

Judge Sophie McKone said it was a targeted group attack in a stolen van. The lorry driver could have woken at any moment and been confronted by the thieves.

Lawn had recruited Cross and had played a leading role in the well-planned enterprise.

Neither he nor Cross had shown any remorse, the judge said.

Lawn was jailed for 22 months and Cross for 12 months.

Burgham was sentenced to eight months imprisonment, suspended for 18 months, with 250 hours of unpaid work. 

Mr Hendron said that Cross was seen on CCTV driving on to Wharfedale Road in a stolen white van on cloned plates.

A security guard spotted the vehicle as the men began to unload boxes from the rear of the lorry.

All were wearing high visibility vests to make their presence look legitimate, the court was told.

The police caught them red-handed and all were arrested at the scene. Lawn was hiding under the lorry trailer, Cross was in the van and Burgham was apprehended after a short chase on foot.

Mr Hendron said the contents of the lorry were valued at £32,000.

Lawn had driven to the scene in his VW Golf and calls had been exchanged between him and Cross.

Cross had admitted the offence on the basis that he wasn’t involved in the planning; he was ‘roped in’ as the driver.

Lawn had 23 previous convictions for offences including numerous matters of dishonesty.

Cross had six convictions for ten offences, including theft and driving while disqualified.

In mitigation for Lawn, it was stated that he had a partner and children and was working as a delivery driver. His motivation was financial and to pay off a drug debt.

He wanted apologise for his actions, saying he had let himself and his family down.

Cross was the getaway driver rather than ‘the driving force,’ his barrister said.

He had a partner and children and worked as a mechanic.

His mother was ill and relied on him to take her to hospital appointments.

Burgham lacked maturity, he was just 20 at the time, and had kept out of trouble since. He was of previous good character and very remorseful.

He was in a relationship and had a job waiting for him.

The court heard that a warrant was outstanding for Jamie Barker, 35, of Broom Gardens, Belle Isle, Leeds, who had pleaded guilty to the theft.

Judge McKone reserved sentencing to herself for when he appears before the court.

• A BRADFORD drug dealer caught in possession of more than £1,000 worth of heroin and crack cocaine was jailed for two and a half years.

Suleman Nawaz’s home was targeted and vehicles damaged after he ran up a cannabis debt that he couldn’t repay, Bradford Crown Court heard.

Nawaz, 25, of Bartle Lane, Great Horton, Bradford, was told to traffic drugs instead and given wraps of heroin and crack cocaine, a phone and a price list.

He was arrested from a car in Buttershaw on July 2, 2021, in possession of 24 wraps of Class A drugs worth £240, prosecutor Heather Gilmore said.

A search of his home address uncovered a further 30 wraps of heroin and 156 wraps of crack cocaine valued at £1,860.

Nawaz also had five tablets of the Class C steroid oxymetholone at his home, Miss Gilmore said.

There was a burner dealer phone in the car, with a contact list and a ‘round robin’ advertising the sale of heroin and crack cocaine.

Nawaz made no comment when questioned by the police.

He pleaded guilty to possession of Class A drugs with intent to supply and simple possession of a Class C drug.

He said he had run up a cannabis debt and agreed to sell the drugs to discharge it. He passed on all money made to his dealer.

Miss Gilmore said Nawaz had been dealing for just a few weeks; messages from customers spoke of him ‘being new to it.’

Khadim Al’Hassan said in mitigation that Nawaz’s home and vehicles were targeted after he ran up a substantial debt.

He had learned his lesson after being ‘pushed into’ dealing and not wanting to get involved. He had been placed in a stranglehold that had made things very difficult for his parents.

He was a hardworking and caring man spoken highly of by many people.

Nawaz had been a heavy cannabis user but he had given it up.

Judge Sophie McKone said he was involved in dealing on a commercial scale and must have been well-trusted because he had a significant amount of drugs at his home.

Although working under direction, he had some awareness of the size of the operation.

“You played your part in peddling misery on the streets of Bradford,” Judge McKone said.

To his credit, his mother said that he was a good son and the head of the household, and he had expressed his regret in a letter to the court.

• A ‘HORRIBLE bully’ who beat his former partner until her face looked like it had been used as a punch bag was jailed for two and a half years.

Kristian Haworth caused the woman the ‘most horrendous injuries,’ covering her body in bites, the judge sentencing him said.

Haworth, 42, formerly of Silsden, near Keighley, but remanded to HMP Leeds, pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to assaulting his victim causing her actual bodily harm on November 21 last year.

Abdul Shakoor, prosecuting, told Bradford Crown Court that the prolonged assault took place at the address they shared at the time.

Haworth had previous convictions for robbery, battery and public order offences.

His barrister, Peter Hampton, said that he had excellent references from the prison.

“When sober, he’s a different man,” he told the court.

He had taken steps to address his offending behaviour while he was remanded.

“He knows what he had done and how appalling it was,” Mr Hampton said.

Haworth was now doing his very best to address his issues.

He had accepted that the relationship had ended. A restraining order would be put in place to protect the woman from him in the future.

The judge, Recorder Dafydd Enoch KC, said it was as serious as an offence of assault occasioning actual bodily harm could get.

‘It was a despicable cowardly attack. You behaved like a horrible bully and a violent one at that,’ he told Haworth.

The assault was prolonged, lasting several hours, and he had caused ‘the most horrendous injuries.’

Recorder Enoch said he had seen photographs of the victim.

“Her face looks like it’s been used as a punch bag and her body is covered in bite marks,” he said.

 “It was domestic violence against a helpless woman who thought she was going to be killed.”

But the recorder said he had to take account of the unusually excellent references that Haworth had earned while on remand in Leeds Prison.

He had done incredibly well and that had to be recognised to encourage him, and to get the message out to others that such positive behaviour would be recognised by the courts.

Recorder Enoch made an indefinite restraining order banning Haworth from contacting his victim or going near her home.

• A JUDGE jailed an angry man in his absence after he walked out of a prison video link room during his sentencing hearing at Bradford Crown Court.

Adrian Hudson had been told he was getting a two-year prison sentence for threatening a man with a knife in August last year.

As Recorder Christopher Rose was outlining the details of the case, Hudson, who had already interrupted him several times and been warned he would be muted if he didn’t stop, got up and left.

The court heard that Hudson, 28, of Sunbridge Road, Bradford, went round to the man’s Bradford home armed with a knife and made threats towards him.

Recorder Rose said that must have been an upsetting and distressing experience.

Then four days later, he went into the man’s flat again and trouble flared.

The complainant picked up a knife he had put under his pillow but during a struggle Hudson took it from him.

Hudson pleaded guilty to an assault charge on the basis that he acted in excessive self-defence. The court was told he struck his victim with an iron.

“It is easy to see why the complainant described himself as being terrified during the course of the incident,” Recorder Rose said.

During the struggle the man suffered a defensive injury to his right hand as he tried to grab the knife.

After his arrest Hudson assaulted a police officer while he was in custody.

He pleaded guilty to threatening with a bladed article, assault and an assault on an emergency worker at Trafalgar House Police Station on August 30.

The court heard that an officer went to the ground and suffered a hand injury.

Hudson’s barrister Clare Walsh said he accepted punching his victim during the struggle at the flat and assaulting him with the iron.

He regretted his actions and his first time in custody had been a sobering experience for him.

Recorder Rose made a five-year restraining order which bans Hudson from contacting the complainant or going into the road where he lives.