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Six Britons acting for the Wagner mercenary group linked to Russia have been sentenced to prison for igniting a London-based warehouse that was storing humanitarian aid intended for Ukraine.

Court Rulings and Involvement

Sentencing the men, the presiding judge at the central criminal court remarked that they had planned a “campaign of terrorism and sabotage” to benefit the Russian government.

Dylan Earl received a 17-year prison sentence with an extra six-year period on extended licence due to his “leading role”. Another defendant, Jake Reeves, a resident of Croydon, South London, was sentenced to 12 years in jail with an additional year on supervised release. The offences they admitted made them the initial persons to be found guilty under the 2023 National Security Act.

Jakeem Rose, aged 23, also a Croydon resident, was sentenced to a term of eight years and ten months. Nii Mensah, 23, a Thornton Heath, South London local, was given nine years imprisonment and Ugnius Asmena, 21, who was without a fixed address, was given seven years in prison. These three individuals were each found guilty of serious fire-setting and given a further year on extended licence by the judge.

Ashton Evans, a 20-year-old drug dealer hailing from Newport, Gwent, was jailed for nine years imprisonment plus a further year on extended licence after being found guilty of withholding information about acts of terrorism connected to another plot in Mayfair.

Details of the Attack

The deliberate fire on a Leyton-based storage facility in East London endangered sixty fire service personnel and caused £1m in damage in March last year.

The court heard that the 21-year-old Earl and the 24-year-old Reeves remained in their residences while organising the attack for the Wagner group, acting on behalf of the Russian Federation.

The group targeted the storage facility because it was being used to supply humanitarian aid and satellite communication gear to Ukraine.

When the same Ukrainian company was hit by an intentional fire ten days afterward in Madrid, detectives from the Met’s counter-terrorism command assumed control of the probe.

Evidence and Further Plans

When Earl was arrested, law enforcement examination of his cellphone uncovered he had videos of the storage facility blaze being started and was in communication with the Wagner group on the Telegram messaging app, via an user profile with the handles ‘Privet Bot account’ and ‘Lucky Strike’.

Some of the communications indicated that preliminary surveillance for additional operations, involving fire-related incidents at a dining establishment and wine shop in Mayfair district belonging to the Russian dissident Evgeny Chichvarkin had already taken place. The employment of explosive devices to harm structures was also discussed.

Detectives discovered that the defendant Earl was also raising the possibility of kidnapping Chichvarkin and “exiling him back to Russia to face prison”.

The individual involved in narcotics from Elmesthorpe in Leicestershire had discussed 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 with a street value of approximately thirty-four thousand pounds.

Driving Factors and Court Comments

The court heard he was a member of numerous channels promoting Russian propaganda and was driven by “plain and severe avarice”.

“This case is about the efforts of the Russian Federation 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” regardless of whether the perpetrators knew it. The Wagner group is banned by the UK government as a terrorist group.