Six Britons acting for Russia’s Wagner group have been handed jail terms for setting fire to a London-based warehouse that was storing relief supplies destined for Ukraine.
Sentencing and Roles
While delivering the sentences, the presiding judge at the Old Bailey remarked that they had planned a “series of terrorist and sabotage acts” in the interests of the Russian state.
Dylan Earl was given a seventeen-year jail term with an additional six years on extended licence due to his “leading role”. Another defendant, Jake Reeves, a resident of Croydon, South London, was given 12 years in prison with one year on supervised release. The offences they admitted made them the first individuals to be convicted under the National Security Act 2023.
Jakeem Rose, aged 23, also a Croydon resident, was sentenced to a term of eight years and ten months. Nii Mensah, a Thornton Heath, South London local, was given nine years and Ugnius Asmena, 21, who was without a fixed address, was given seven years. The trio were each found guilty of aggravated arson and given a additional year on supervised release by the judge.
Ashton Evans, a 20-year-old drug dealer from Newport in Gwent, was sentenced to nine years imprisonment plus a further year on extended licence after being found guilty of failing to disclose information about acts of terrorism connected to another plot in Mayfair.
Details of the Attack
The deliberate fire on a Leyton-based storage facility in East London put 60 firefighters at risk and caused £1m in damage in March of the previous year.
The proceedings revealed that Earl, 21 and Reeves, 24 did not leave their bedrooms while coordinating the incident for the Wagner mercenary organization, representing the Russian government.
The individuals involved selected the storage facility because it was being utilized for providing emergency relief and StarLink satellite equipment to Ukraine.
When the same Ukrainian company was hit by an arson attack 10 days later in Madrid, investigators from the Metropolitan Police's anti-terror unit took over the investigation.
Evidence and Further Plans
When Earl was taken into custody, law enforcement examination of his cellphone uncovered he had recordings of the storage facility blaze being initiated and was in communication with the Wagner organization on the Telegram messaging app, via an account with the handles ‘Privet Bot’ and ‘Lucky Strike’.
Some of the messages showed that preliminary surveillance for further “missions”, involving fire-related incidents at a restaurant and wine store in Mayfair district belonging to the Russian dissident Evgeny Chichvarkin had already been carried out. The employment of explosive devices to harm structures was also deliberated.
Investigators discovered that Earl was also considering the potential abduction of Chichvarkin and “exiling him back to Russia to confront imprisonment”.
The drug dealer from Elmesthorpe in Leicestershire had talked about an additional planned incident in the Czech Republic.
In a search of his home, law enforcement found a Russian flag, more than £20,000 in cash and cocaine with a street value of about £34,000.
Driving Factors and Court Comments
The proceedings revealed he was a member of multiple pro-Russian propaganda channels and was driven by “plain and severe avarice”.
“This case is about the attempts by the Russian government to gain pernicious global influence using social media to recruit disruptors vast distances from Moscow.”
She found the arson attack had a “terrorist connection” regardless of whether the individuals responsible were aware of it. The Wagner organization is proscribed by the British authorities as a terrorist organisation.
