BAINBRIDGE: WOMEN JAILED FOR HIDING FIREARM

Two women who helped conceal an antique revolver wept as they were jailed for a total of ten years.

Robyn Bainbridge, 25, and Gemma Nunn, 28, were caught in west London with a Smith and Wesson revolver and a stash of .44 modified cartridges.

Bainbridge had been ‘looking after’ the deadly cache for close friend David Joseph, 26, who was caught as he passed the gun and ammunition to ‘runner’ Nunn in a leisure centre carpark.

Bainbridge and Nunn were each jailed for five years while Joseph was ordered to serve six years at Southwark Crown Court.

Nunn agreed to act as a courier in return for cannabis to feed her £40 a day addiction while Bainbridge was ‘exploited and abused’ by her close friend Joseph.

The Judge, Mr Recorder John Ryder, QC, ruled both women were fully aware the package contained a potentially deadly firearm.

He said: ‘The unlawful circulation of firearms occasions grave danger to the public.

‘It’s purpose is inevitably violent and criminal and fear, injury and death can result.

Jailing Joseph he said: ‘Your intention in the activity was to sell this gun.

‘You identified Robyn Bainbridge’s premises as a safe house at which to store this item.

‘You exploited and abused your relationship with her to recruit her to assist you.

‘Your relationship was a close one and you might wish to reflect on the fact that your recruiting of her to this activity has had a devastating effect on her life and that of her family.

‘To carry out the sale of a functioning firearm as well as ammunition modified to be used in that firearm is a grave example of the offences charged.

‘The use to which such items could be put is inevitably criminal and potentially fatal.’

Turning to Nunn, who wept as she listened, the judge blasted her for succumbing to her ‘overwhelming’ addiction to cannabis.

‘You played an active and critical part in that exchange,’ he said.

‘You were motivated to do so and blinded to the potential consequences as you thought only of yourself and your craving for cannabis.’

As she was led away she wailed ‘I’m innocent, I’m innocent’.

The judge told tearful Bainbridge: ‘You wholly failed to treat seriously that which so obviously called for the most serious attention.

‘You allowed this weapon to be stored at your house.

‘For that the law prescribes in the absence of exceptional circumstances a minimum term of imprisonment.

‘As I have already indicated there are no exceptional circumstances and therefore I am unable to reduce the sentence, therefore the sentence that you must also serve is one of five years.’

The court heard Bainbridge, a former student at the University of Roehampton, had allowed Joseph to store the gun and ammunition at her home for two weeks.

Joseph then took the lethal cache to a meeting with Nunn in the carpark outside Brentford Leisure Centre in Kew Bridge Road on February 11 this year.

When police swooped on the car they discovered the gun and ammunition inside a carrier bag and £3,000 in cash inside a second bag.

At least one of Nunn’s fingerprints was found on the bag containing the money and a photograph of bundles of cash ‘similar’ to those seized by police was retrieved from her phone.

Bainbridge, of (47A) Kew Bridge Road, Brentford, Middlesex and Nunn, of (291) Wandsworth Bridge Road, Fulham, West London, were convicted of possessing a prohibited weapon and ammunition without a certificate.

Joseph, of (43) Thames Court, Hanway Road, Hanwell, west London, admitted conspiracy to transfer a prohibited firearm, conspiracy to possess ammunition without a certificate and possessing ammunition without a certificate before the trial started.
ENDS