{"id":65631,"date":"2015-12-17T13:47:44","date_gmt":"2015-12-17T13:47:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?guid=a152551a47d0c79cc053db7fc4076a76"},"modified":"2015-12-17T13:47:44","modified_gmt":"2015-12-17T13:47:44","slug":"news-story-prison-sentences-of-west-midlands-gang-referred-to-court-of-appeal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?p=65631","title":{"rendered":"News story: Prison sentences of West Midlands gang referred to Court of Appeal"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"govspeak\">\n<p>The offenders were sentenced earlier this year in a high-profile case which saw the members of the gang receive prison terms after being convicted of supplying guns to criminal gangs around the country. <\/p>\n<p>They were caught trafficking a number of dangerous weapons and ammunition, including a number of handguns, a sawn-off shotgun and a MAC 10 machine gun.<\/p>\n<p>Nosakhere Stephenson was the head of the group and his gang was linked to the notorious Burger Bar gang in Birmingham.<\/p>\n<p>All the offenders were charged on an indictment containing six counts of conspiracy to transfer prohibited weapons and ammunition, and sentenced in Birmingham Crown Court in November.<\/p>\n<p>However, the Solicitor General today referred the sentences of all offenders to the Court of Appeal under the Unduly Lenient Sentence scheme. Speaking today, he said:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAfter careful consideration of the details of these cases, I decided to refer these sentences to the Court of Appeal due to the serious nature of the offences concerned.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThese were professional criminals running a sophisticated operation which involved a high degree of planning. The offences had a terrible impact on those who were caught up in violence further down the line.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is now a matter for the Court to determine whether the sentences should be increased.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3 id=\"notes-to-editors\">Notes to editors:<\/h3>\n<p>For more information on the ULS scheme please visit the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/organisations\/attorney-generals-office\">AGO website<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Our website also includes information on how to complain about a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/complain-about-low-crown-court-sentence\">low Crown Court sentence<\/a> <\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Fourteen offenders linked to the infamous Burger Bar Boys gang in Birmingham may have their prison sentences increased after a referral today by Solicitor General, Robert Buckland QC MP.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65631"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=65631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65631\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=65631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=65631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=65631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}