A grandfather lied about his Volvo being stolen in a burglary – after the car was crashed in a collision that wrote-off a £10,000 Nissan Leaf.
John Mangan, 54, roped-in then partner Juanita Kerr, 47, to help back-up the lie, getting her to tell the police that the couple were together on the night of the supposed theft.
The cooked-up tale was unmasked after DNA testing on the airbag proved that Mangan had been in the car when it collided with a parked Nissan and Mitsubishi in Benson on March 4.
Sentencing the pair at Oxford Crown Court, Judge Maria Lamb said: “These are serious matters. It has to be understood that the offence of perverting the course of justice is a grave one.
“It is absolutely fundamental that police can rely on the information that they are given in order to carry out their investigations and in order that the expenditure which is very stretched and the resources which are very stretched are applied in a way that enables the truth to be reached.
“And there has been a great deal of waste of both expenditure as a result of the action [of the defendants].”
Michael Speak, prosecuting, said Mangan had called the police in March 2021 reporting that his Volvo saloon had been stolen overnight between March 4 and 5 together with his car keys in a burglary on his home in Green Close, Benson.
On the same night, Mangan’s silver Volvo was found abandoned in Old London Road with significant damage to its bodywork and the airbags deployed. It had struck two other vehicles.
A black Nissan Leaf worth around £10,000, was written off in the crash. The other car, a Mitsubishi Outlander, cost around £2,000 to repair.
Both defendants maintained their lie even after they were interviewed following forensic tests showing Mangan’s DNA was on the deployed airbag. Mangan ‘did not explain’ why his DNA was found, the court heard. Kerr said she had been drinking heavily and it was ‘all a bit of a blur’.
Mangan, of Green Close, Benson, and Kerr, of Beeching Way, Wallingford, pleaded guilty to perverting the course of justice.
Bethan Chichester, for Mangan, said he had ‘panicked after doing something quite foolish’ then ‘dug his heels in’. He was said to have turned to alcohol as a ‘crutch’ after the tragic death of his grandson four years ago. He was jailed for six months.
Gordana Austin, for Kerr, said her client had a ‘number of vulnerabilities’ and had come under pressure from her co-defendant. She received six months’ imprisonment suspended for two years with a six month mental health treatment requirement and up to 30 probation sessions.
Judge Lamb said she should be under ‘no illusion’ that she would go to prison if she committed further offences or breached the suspended sentence order.
“The fact of the matter was you had ample opportunity in October to tell the police that you had done a very stupid and ill-advised thing in supporting your co-defendant in the statement you gave,” she added.
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This story was written by Tom Seaward. He joined the team in 2021 as Oxfordshire's court and crime reporter.
To get in touch with him email: Tom.Seaward@newsquest.co.uk
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