Community order for thief who took Royal Mail van

[TrueBlueTerrier]

https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/19507 ... -mail-van/

A thief stole a Royal Mail van parked up at the Oxford depot – then wore a branded red jacket as he filled up with £60-worth of diesel and sped off.

Days later, John Joyce swiped a jacket left in a Sainsbury’s delivery van and made off in the driver’s own Vauxhall Astra.

This week, magistrates spared the 24-year-old a prison spell after hearing he’d already spent much of the past year in custody on remand or on a curfew tag.

His sentencing hearing at Oxford Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday came less than two weeks after a judge at the crown court sent him down for eight months for stealing an Amazon delivery driver’s Transit.


Because of the amount of time he’d spent on remand and on tag he had already been released on licence when he appeared before the justices.

Prosecutor Ann Sawyer-Brandish said a postman had parked his red Royal Mail van at the back of the depot on April 16 last year.

He thought the vehicle’s keys must have fallen from his pocket as he walked to the depot, as when he went back to the van it was gone. Inside the van were the keys to several post boxes.

At 5.45pm, the van pulled up at the Shell garage on Garsington Road. Joyce, wearing a red jacket, filled up with £60-worth of diesel and drove off without paying. The post van was spotted at 7.50pm that evening on the A423, with police officers later finding it abandoned.

Three days later, on April 19, the defendant got into a parked Sainsbury’s delivery van and stole the driver’s uniform jacket. The keys to the driver’s own vehicle, a Vauxhall Astra, were inside the coat. He discovered the car was missing.

The Astra was spotted driving towards the A34 and later found abandoned. Joyce was identified from fingerprints left on the vehicle.

Mitigating, Will Alexander said his client had been involved with a ‘bad crowd’ at the time. He had been a passenger in the Astra but accepted being carried in the stolen car.

“Since the offences, Mr Joyce has had a significant amount of growing up to do. He has been through an extremely difficult period,” his solicitor said. He had suffered significantly with poor mental health and his brother was killed last summer.