Pensioner joined gang & acted as getaway driver because he was lonely!
An 81-year-old pensioner has got himself banged up after he joined a county lines gang and helped two criminals escape after they stabbed a rival drug dealer. Apparently he only joined the gang because he was lonely. Well, I guess that’s as good a reason as any I suppose.
Ian Hemmens says he joined the gang to combat his crippling loneliness and because ‘he liked talking to people’. He apparently drove Akeem Adebayo and Mahamud Sami to Bognor Regis where Sami found and stabbed gang rival, Dimitrijs Semelis. Ian then acted as the getaway driver for Sami and drove him away from the crime crime. Here’s what Judge Roger Hetherington said:
You assisted an offender by driving him away from the scene when you knew he must have been involved in a serious assault, you saw blood on him and you undoubtedly knew that he had been involved in drug dealing.
But your involvement was considerably more than this one journey, you made several journeys on that day and on the night before, you would have been aware that you were being used as a driver whose age and appearance would have been unlikely to draw attention.
Here’s what Ian Hemmens defence lawyer Mark Hessler said:
The defendant admits that he likes talking to people and that is why it has come about.
Erm. Hardly an excuse though is it. There are plenty of clubs and groups he could have joined. Go and join a bowls club FFS, all old people like bowls. He’s now been sentenced to nine months in person so it looks like his loneliness will be combatted for the time being.
