The bulldozer bandits accused of the Dome gems rai

The bulldozer bandits accused of the Dome gems raid plotted only to steal the fabulous diamond collection and not stage a robbery, the Old Bailey heard today.

(Thurs)

Four of the six have confessed – but only to the planned theft of the Millennium Star and 11 other flawless stones.

Jurors have watched dramatic film footage of Robert Adams, Aldo Ciarrocchi, Raymond Betson and William Cockran crashing through a gate near the diamond vault in a specially modified JCB.

But heavily armed police threw smoke grenades into the de Beers chamber to thwart the four gang members.

The four deny intending to use the threat of force – despite being caught after hurtling into the Dome on a JCB armed with ammonia and smoke bombs.

And prosecutor Martin Heslop, QC, told the jury the four had no choice but to admit the lesser charge.

‘As to the first four since they were caught red handed you may think their options are rather limited to put it mildly,’ he told the jury.

‘You may think in the circumstance of this case they had little option but to admit something such as a lesser offence.

‘It is about the only thing they could do apart from the Crown say, being completely frank and taking the consequences.

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He said the the admitting conspiracy to steal ‘was no more then an attempt to try and support the proposition that they were not involved in a plan to rob.

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Arming themselves with ammonia and donning body armour meant it was inevitable the gang had considered the possibility that someone would try and stop them, the QC said.

‘No one involved in this criminal enterprise could consider it could be carried out without meeting any resistance or without at the very least, the threat of force.

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Mr Heslop said if this were true the four were guilty of robbery – a much more serious offence.

‘It is obvious and you can be sure that the first four were not involved in a conspiracy to steal but were involved in a conspiracy to rob.

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Mr Heslop said the two other gang members, Wayne Taylor and Kevin Meredith, will claim they were simply not involved in a plot to rob or steal.

Boat skipper Meredith was apprehended by armed river police as he waited in the gang’s speedboat at Millennium pier.

Another member of the team Terence Millman, 56, who died of cancer earlier this year, was arrested in a transit van across the river at Bow Creek.

Millman, originally from Brixworth, Northants, was to be the getaway driver once the gang had escaped across the water in the high powered speedboat.

Taylor, who had visited the Dome and allegedly helped prepare for the raid, was arrested after the failed heist.

Ciarrocchi, 31, of Balaclava Road, Rotherhithe, charter skipper Meredith, 34, of Auckland Drive, Brighton, Adams, 57, and market trader Betson, 39, both of no fixed address, Cockran, 48, of Penberth Road, Catford, and Taylor, 35, of Colliers Street, Tonbridge, Kent, all deny conspiracy to rob on November 7 last year.

The trial continues.

ends