Man jailed after conspiracy to steal more than 100 vehicles in the East
A man's been sentenced to more than five years in prison after being found guilty of conspiracy to steal vehicles in the East of England.
Last updated 9th Nov 2020
Miroslav Pesko, of Greenbury Road, Charlton in London, was found guilty following a trial at Norwich Crown Court.
The first trial had been suspended after being part heard due to Covid-19 restrictions.
Six men were arrested as part of an investigation by East Suffolk CID in 2019 into a number of vehicle thefts across the region.
Pesko was arrested alongside two other men, Almantas Andriuskevicius and Ignas Bielevicius both 25-years-old and both of London Road South, Lowestoft, on the 5th September 2019.
Later that day Dzanetas Simanskas, a 27-year-old man of London Road South, Lowestoft was arrested after police executed a number of search warrants at premises in the town and Tadas Taraskevicius, a 27-year-old man, of no fixed abode, was arrested in Norwich.
All five were charged later that month with conspiring with one another to steal motor vehicles between 26 January 2019 and 6 September 2019. Andriuskevicius, Bielevicius and Simanskas were also charged with fraudulently using registration marks, namely various number plates used on stolen motor vehicles during the same time period.
A sixth man who was being investigated by police in connection with the conspiracy fled to Lithuania from the UK in 2019.
Police made an application for a European Arrest Warrant and after liaising with the Lithuanian authorities Viktoras Sakalauskas aged 26 years was arrested. Suffolk police officers travelled to Lithuania in October 2020 and collected Sakalauskas.
He was returned to the UK and was charged with conspiracy to steal motor vehicles and fraudulent use of vehicle registration plates. Sakalauskas appeared before Norwich Crown Court on 20 October and pleaded guilty to both offences and was remanded into custody to be sentenced at a later date.
Suffolk Police say Miroslav Pesko was the head of this organised crime group, using specialist skills and knowledge to facilitate the thefts of the vehicles.
Andriuskevicius, Sakalauskas, Bielevicius, Simanskas and Tarasekevicius were the offenders going out at night travelling all over the East of England to physically steal Mercedes vans. The prosecution accepted that Taraskevicius was a less significant member of the gang who only went out with the others on a few occasions.
The court heard how Andriuskevicius and his co-defendants would drive around looking for suitable vehicles to steal, after breaking into them they would remove the Electronic Ignition Switch (EIS) from the vehicle and then travel to the home address of Pesko in London.
Whilst the thieves waited nearby Pesko would recode a new blank key to work in the stolen ignition switch. The thieves then drove back to the vehicle they had removed it from and after fitting the ignition switch back in the van they were then able to drive it away.
The vehicles were often then stripped of personal belongings which were dumped on the roadside, any vehicle tracking devices were removed and disposed of and the genuine registration plates were replaced with cloned plates.
The vehicles were then driven by the gang to a garage in Essex known as a ‘chop shop’ where they were broken down into parts. The parts were later sold on or shipped abroad. The court heard how Pesko had links to the ‘chop shop’ based in Essex.
Dzanetas Simanskas plead guilty to the conspiracy and to fraudulently using vehicle registration plates and was jailed for 12 months when he appeared before Norwich Crown Court on 28 May 2020.
Almantas Andriuskevicius (AKA Zuira) and Ignas Bielevicius both pleaded guilty to the conspiracy and to fraudulently using vehicle registration plates when they appeared before Norwich Crown Court on 7 February 2020. On 28 May 2020 Bielevicius was sentenced to 18 months in jail when he appeared before the same court. Zuira is due to be sentenced at a later date.
Tadas Taraskevicius pleaded guilty when he appeared before Norwich Crown Court on 26 August 2020 and was imprisoned for a total of 15 months - nine months for the conspiracy offence and six months for unrelated theft and burglaries offences.
Detective Inspector Matt Adams who led the operation said: "This investigation began in May last year and was initially aimed at targeting the suspected criminal activity of those individuals who lived in Lowestoft.
"The investigation soon grew and we were able to identify other thieves as well as the involvement of Miroslav Pesko based in London.
"The scale of the conspiracy against Pesko was proven to involve the theft of over 100 Mercedes vans from across the East of England.
"The value placed on the loss of these vehicles is well in excess of 1 million pounds...
"...although this does not take include the loss of personal property from inside the vehicles or the loss of earnings suffered by many who relied upon their vans to go about their daily business.
"The investigation has had a number of complexities to overcome and taken several months to reach this point. The whole investigation team have worked exceptionally hard to bring these offenders to justice. I am also grateful to the support given to us by a number of other specialist policing teams from across the region.”