A group of six individuals from Britain acting for Russia’s Wagner group have been sentenced to prison for setting fire to a located in London storage unit that was holding humanitarian aid destined for Ukraine.
Sentencing and Roles
Sentencing the men, the presiding judge at the Old Bailey stated that they had planned a “series of terrorist and sabotage acts” to benefit the Russian government.
Dylan Earl received a 17-year jail term with an additional six years on supervised release due to his “primary involvement”. Jake Reeves, from Croydon in south London, was given twelve years in jail with one year on extended licence. The offences they admitted made them the first individuals to be found guilty under the 2023 National Security Act.
Jakeem Rose, also from Croydon, was jailed for eight years and 10 months. Nii Mensah, 23, a Thornton Heath, South London local, was given nine years and Ugnius Asmena, 21, who was homeless, was handed seven years in prison. These three individuals were each convicted of serious fire-setting and given a further year on extended licence by the judge.
Ashton Evans, a 20-year-old drug dealer from Newport in Gwent, was jailed for nine years imprisonment plus a further year on supervised release after being convicted of withholding information about terrorist acts connected to a separate scheme in Mayfair.
Details of the Attack
The arson attack on a warehouse in Leyton, east London endangered sixty fire service personnel and caused £1m in damage in March last year.
The court heard 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 group targeted the storage facility because it was being used to supply emergency relief and satellite communication gear to Ukraine.
When the identical Ukrainian firm was subjected to an arson attack 10 days later in the Spanish capital, detectives from the Met’s counter-terrorism command assumed control of the investigation.
Proof and Additional Schemes
When Earl was arrested, law enforcement examination of his cellphone revealed he had recordings of the storage facility blaze being started and was in contact with the Wagner group on Telegram, via an user profile with the handles ‘Privet Bot account’ and ‘Lucky Strike’.
Some of the communications showed that preliminary surveillance for additional operations, involving fire-related incidents at a dining establishment and wine store in Mayfair owned by the Russian dissident Evgeny Chichvarkin had already been carried out. The use of explosives to damage buildings was also deliberated.
Investigators discovered that Earl was also raising the possibility of kidnapping 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 hydrochloride with a street value of about £34,000.
Motivations and Judicial Remarks
The proceedings revealed he was a member of multiple pro-Russian propaganda channels and was driven by “simple and ugly greed”.
“This case is about the attempts by the Russian government to gain pernicious global influence using online platforms to recruit disruptors far from the Russian capital.”
She found the fire incident had a “link to terrorism” irrespective of if the individuals responsible knew it. The Wagner group is banned by the British authorities as a terrorist organisation.
