Jail for burglar trio who jumped into the sea at Hayling Island to escape police after car chase

Brothers Benjamin and Joshua Peace, and their pal Michael Antram, burst into a garage. They loaded two mountain bikes worth £900 and £2,700 into a car and damaged another worth £1,200.

Portsmouth Crown Court heard the Portsmouth and Havant trio, who have scores of past offences between them, took the bikes from a garage at a home in Funtington at around 4.30am on January 23.

Bike wheels thrown from car in police chase

They led officers on a chase to Hayling Island throwing wheels and beer bottles from the moving car and then stopped at a caravan park near the seafront.

At sentencing Benjamin, who has 41 convictions for 125 offences, appeared on videolink from jail where he is serving a sentence for arson and assault after attacking his brother Joshua and setting fire to a house after barricading him in.

Prosecutor Timothy Moores said: ‘All three men left the vehicle, (a police officer) found the driver who waded out into the and waited for him to come out of the water.

‘After a few minutes that male de-merged from the water and was subsequently identified as Ben Peace. Other police units came and a dog, and the other two were found wet and muddy.’

Drunk threw bottle off bridge on to car below

Then, the court heard how on May 15 both Joshua Peace and Antram were on the bridge over the A27 at Peronne Road in Hilsea when Antram chucked a beer bottle down into the carriageway hitting unsuspecting driver Binh Nguyen’s car and windscreen.

Mr Nguyen stopped on the hard shoulder and remonstrated with three men on the bridge - including Peace, who has 32 convictions for 71 offences, and Antram.

They launched into a vicious racist tirade calling the Vietnamese heritage man ‘Chinese kung fu’ and telling him to go home.

Mr Nguyen returned to his car and drove home. Days later on July 1 he saw the defendants in Portsmouth city centre and filmed them on his phone, handing the recordings to police who identified them. DNA on the bottle was linked to Antram.

Jail sentences for trio

Michael Antram, 28, of no fixed address but known as a Portsmouth man, was jailed for four years by Recorder Charles Morrison.

Joshua Peace, 28, of Curdridge Close, Havant was sentenced to two years and 10 months.

Benjamin Peace, 26, of HMP Erlestoke, but from Havant, was handed an three-year and two-month term. It will run consecutive to a 58-month sentence for an assault on his brother Joshua and arson.

Mayhem on the railway

DRUNKARD Michael Antram admitted causing mayhem on the railway before threatening to kill two police officers.

Portsmouth man Antram, 28, of no fixed address, was spotted on a train running amok with two others forcing rail staff to stop at Fareham at 10.40pm.

Antram, who fled the train on a stolen bike, ended up swinging a punch hitting the driver and train conductor causing bruising and a small cut on the driver’s lip, said prosecutor Simon Foster.

Before police could arrive Antram, who has scores of convictions including one past court case where he confessed to 159 crimes in one go, jumped onto the tracks and threw stone ballast from the rails at a passenger.

When police did arrive he told an officer: 'I hope your kids die of cancer, I'm going to find you, I'm going to get you. I'm going to kill you and your kids.'

Then when arrested and taken to custody he told another PC: 'When I'm released I'll wait outside the station, better have your stab vest because I'm going to stab you in the head.'

Sentencing Antram, Recorder Charles Morrison said the words were ‘the worst levels of abuse they’d ever been subjected to in their time as police officers’.

These are the crimes the defendants were sentenced for committing

:: Michael Antram admitted burglary causing a danger to road users, two charges of assault by beating, one of using threatening words or behaviour, one trespass on railway, and two threats to kill.

:: Joshua Peace and Benjamin Peace both admitted burglary.

:: Magistrates convicted Antram and Joshua Peace of racially-aggravated causing harassment, alarm or distress at a trial.