`James Bond film man` convicted of supplying guns linked to murders
28-Aug-2008 • Bond News
Share the Story
He converted replica Mac-10 "spray and pray" weapons in a shed in a Berkshire village and supplied them to criminal gangs across the country.
One of the machine guns was linked to the killing of Pc Beshenivsky in West Yorkshire in 2005.
The other victims were all in London and included Michael Dosunmu, the 15-year-old who was shot dead in his bedroom by a gang after being mistaken for his brother.
Wilkinson converted 90 of the weapons, which he had brought from a legitimate arms supplier after claiming to be working on a new James Bond film.
Police chiefs said he had set up a business producing weapons "solely for killing". He used the cash from selling the guns to dine at top restaurants and stay at luxury hotels, police sources said.
The criminal armoury operated for three years, in which time police could not explain a surge in shootings using Mach 10s. They were sold on the street for between £1,500-£2,500.
Forensic experts, who spent a total of four years in man hours on the case, analysed every shooting in Britain where distinctive Mac-10 spent cartridges were found at the scene.
Detectives believe that the guns have been used in a total of 51 gun-related crimes, including 24 non-fatal shootings and eight homicides. A further 40 machine guns had not been recovered and police are appealing for gangs to hand them in.
Wilkinson is now facing life in jail after being found guilty at Reading Crown Court after a month-long trial.
He had set up the gun factory in outbuildings in the grounds of a house known as The Briars in Three Mile Cross, near Reading.
The replicas were bought for £55,000 in cash from a dealer at Sabre Defence Industries in 2004 and converted using drills and basic tools.
The factory was discovered last July after a tenant of the semi-detached house "stumbled" across a shed with the windows blacked out with bin liners and found tools such as a lathe and drills.
Police were called and recovered three Mach 10s in a holdall, in various stages of conversion, and 2,700 discharged cartridges in a testing range.
It emerged that one of the weapons produced was used in the shooting which killed PC Beshenivsky, although it was not the weapon that killed her during the bungled armed robbery of a travel agency in Bradford. Her colleague PC Teresa Milburn was seriously in crossfire.
Det Chf Supt George Turner, of Thames Valley Police, who led the investigation, said that the intention of the defendants was to endanger lives.
"Gun factories themselves are very rare and there have only been a relatively small number in recent years," he said.
"These are self-taught people who are supplying directly into criminal networks.
"They were weapons produced solely for killing and in our view the only possible consequence of their actions was the endangering of human life."
Detectives from the Metropolitan Police's Operation Trident - which targets gun crime in the black community - appealed for help in tracing the missing weapons.
Claudia Webbe, the chairman of an advisory group to Trident, said: "The availability of these weapons is clearly fuelling violence on our streets, they have caused devastating shootings, deaths, murders, mayhem in inner city London."
Wilkinson was convicted of seven offences: conspiracy to convert imitation firearms; conspiracy to sell or transfer firearms; conspiracy to sell or transfer ammunition; two counts of possession of firearms with intent to endanger life; and two counts of possession of ammunition with intent to endanger life.
He claimed in his defence that he was working for a man called Kevin Danaher, who was murdered in May 2006, stabbed to death by an associate.
A second man, Garry Lewis, was found not guilty by the jury of being part of the conspiracy and cleared of all counts.
The law governing replica firearms and components needed for conversion changed last year, making it illegal to own blank-firing weapons without a licence.
Discuss this news here...
