Graffiti pair given five-year ASBOs for train damage (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Graffiti pair given five-year ASBOs for train damage

8:00am Wednesday 8th February 2012 in News By Jenny Loweth

Rail graffiti vandal David Broadbent goaded British Transport Police by posing defiantly in front of a train defaced with “BTP are mugs”.

He and accomplice Paul Scott brazenly displayed images of their criminal handiwork on the internet and exchanged boastful messages on social networking site Facebook.

But BTP proved the pair wrong when its detective work netted them by matching their “tags” Mesie and Croke with spray-paint damage to Northern Rail property across West Yorkshire.

Broadbent, 20, of Brook Street, Brighouse, and Scott, 18, of Tyersal Avenue, Tyersal, Bradford, were sentenced for a spree of graffiti damage to trains and railway walls and buildings stretching from Skipton to Bradford and Huddersfield.

Broadbent admitted causing £14,000 criminal damage to nine trains and five lineside structures between August 2009 and March 2010.

Scott confessed to spray-painting murals on two trains and damaging 13 other railway walls and buildings at a cost of £3,000, between January and July 2010.

Yesterday both were ordered to carry out unpaid work by a judge as he sentenced them at Bradford Crown Court and he told them he hoped they would be cleaning up “the sort of mess that you have made”.

Prosecutor John Topham said the defendants, who were then teenagers, were part of the graffiti crew sub-culture that posted its work on the internet and published it in magazines.

Trains left overnight on sidings were a favourite target as the “artwork” was immediately visible.

They were caught red-handed after spray-painting a shop in Leeds city centre on April 7, 2010.

They were cautioned but BTP graffiti specialist investigator PC Tony McGibbon, looking into the trail of damage to the railways, matched their tags to the vandalised trains.

Their homes were raided and their computers, containing numerous images of their handiwork, seized.

Facebook messages boasted about what they had done. Spray paint cans were found in rucksacks as well as a camera containing pictures of their tags.

Scott’s laptop computer contained 117 images of graffiti, including 82 of his tag.

The court heard Scott was now running his own business marketing logos and fliers.

His barrister, Adam Walker, said his client “wholeheartedly agreed” he should help clear up similar mess.

Judge John Potter told the pair it was not a victimless crime. They immersed themselves in a culture of graffiti spraying that could have affected thousands of people in West Yorkshire. Commuters faced disrupted journeys as defaced trains were taken out of service to be cleaned.

Broadbent was sentenced to ten months custody suspended for 18 months with 300 hours unpaid work.

Scott received a 12-month community order with 150 hours unpaid work and a £500 compensation order. In addition both were given five-year Anti-Social Behaviour Orders.

After the case, Detective Constable Jason Ridgway, of BTP, said: “These vandals carried out a spree that caused rail operators an 18-month headache. The damage and clean-up costs mounted to more than £30,000, costs that have to be borne by someone and that someone is ultimately the fare-paying passenger.

“Their so-called tags, which were planned and well-organised, were placed with the sole intention of causing as much damage and disruption to passengers as possible.

“They used essential rail infrastructure as their canvas and will now serve a five-year ABSO each for their efforts.”

Warrick Dent, general manager for Network Rail, said: “Each year Network Rail spends more than £3.5 million on the removal of graffiti – money which could otherwise be spent on improving the railway.”