12 criminals from Sunderland and Wearside who have been jailed so far this year
Wearside criminals kept the courts busy last month.
By Kevin Clark
Published 7th Feb 2020, 11:00 BST
Updated 8th Feb 2020, 18:13 BST
Here is a round up of a dozen criminals who were jailed for various different crimes including murder, rape and theft.
9. David Nicholson
David Nicholson was jailed for almost a decade after admitting raping a child during a a lie detector test as part of an investigation into unrelated sex offences.
In 2018 David Nicholson was given a community order after he traveled to Sunderland to meet what he believed to be a 13-year-old girl he had been chatting to online but was instead confronted by paedophile hunters Dark Justice, who had set up the fake profile.
The 46-year-old was asked by the police during the arrest and investigation process if he would participate in a polygraph test.
Newcastle Crown Court heard Nicholson agreed and confessed during the lie detector questioning that he had attacked a girl in his past, while he was living in a bedsit in Sunderland, and told detectives who she was.
Nicholson, now of Gatacre Street, Blyth, Northumberland, admitted rape and six offences of indecent assault.
Judge Stephen Earl praised the victim's courage in providing details of her ordeal when she was approached by the police and jailed Nicholson for nine years and four months with a two-year extended licence period. Photo: Northumbria Police
Alan Dunlop started 2020 behind bars when he was jailed on New Year's Day after being caught trying to break into a Range Rover just before Christmas.
South Tyneside Magistrates'' Court heard Dunlop scaled a 6ft electric gate to gain entry to a gated community off the city’s Queen Alexandra Road, where he tried to get into the vehicle.
He was spotted by its owner who then gave chase and, after catching up with him, contacted Northumbria Police.
The 33-year-old, of Argyle Square, Sunderland, was convicted of attempted theft from a motor vehicle and breach of a Criminal Behaviour Order (CBO).
He was jailed for 28 weeks. Photo: Northumbria Police
Phillip Anderson was been jailed for 12 weeks for breaching a landmark court order to stay away from his parents’ Sunderland home.
South Tyneside Magistrates’ Court heard 32-year-old Philip Anderson’s dad contacted police after he turned up drunk in the garden of the couple's Pilgrim Close property on Sunday, January 12.
Anderson’s actions were in defiance of a strict court order, imposed at Newcastle Crown Court in April last year, with conditions which included staying away from three Sunderland streets.
He was issued the first Criminal Behaviour Order (CBO) of its kind in Sunderland last year after a series of drink-fuelled offending.
The court order contained a positive behavioural requirement which compelled Anderson to actively tackle his alcohol addiction – something that had never been given in the city before.
It also forced him to complete a comprehensive programme in a bid to halt his offending, while he was also banned from entering areas of Wearside and was subjected to a strict night-time curfew.
Anderson, of Rutherglen Road, Red House, received the three-year order after appearing before Newcastle Crown Court on April 9 last year. Photo: Northumbria Police
John James Macleod was jailed for five years for keeping a store of firearms and ammunition at his home.
After Durham Constabulary received information that Macleod had a stock of potentially lethal weapons, armed officers swooped on his home in Great Lumley, near Chester-le-Street, in September last year.
Macleod, then aged 26, was detained in a garden shed, where police also discovered seven cannabis plants.
Search teams uncovered four firearms and 85 rounds of ammunition inside the address, in black bin bags sealed with masking tape.
The haul included a double barrelled sawn-off shotgun, a Llama self-loading pistol, a revolver and a paintball gun converted into a viable automatic weapon, 43 live 9mm bullets, 25 shotgun cartridges and a magazine of ammunition.
Macleod, of Sevenacres, in Great Lumley, admitted a string of firearms offences at Duhram Crown Court . Photo: Durham Constabulary