Four guilty over security van raids

Terence Wallace, 26, Adrian Johnson, 28, Leroy Wilkinson, 29, and Victor Iniodu, 34, all from south London, were members of a ruthless mob who targeted security vans making cash deliveries to banks, netting £500,000 across the south of England.

Raids took place in Oxford, Swindon, Bristol, Bath, Cambridgeshire, Hampshire, Reading, Ipswich and Gloucestershire between April 2006 and September 2007.

But the 18-month spree was brought to a dramatic end when a police marksman shot ringleader Mark Nunes and accomplice Andrew Markland dead during a foiled raid in Chandlers Ford, Hampshire.

During the month-long trial at Kingston Crown Court, the jury heard that 35-year-old Nunes' "luck ran out" when he was gunned down as he held a pistol to the head of a security guard close to a branch of HSBC in the village.

Markland, 36, was also shot dead when he tried to pick up the weapon.

Getaway driver Wallace and other gang members Johnson, Wilkinson and Iniodu were found guilty by the jury of conspiracy to rob after more than 15 hours of deliberations.

Johnson was also convicted of a separate robbery committed last November but acquitted of possessing a gas canister. The jury could not agree a verdict on the charge of Johnson possessing a gun and a not guilty verdict was formally entered on this count.

All four had denied the charges during the seven-week trial. Three other men - Leroy Hall, Leon McKenzie and Brian Henry - pleaded guilty to being part of Nunes' gang before the trial began.

The whole gang will be sentenced at Kingston Crown Court in a hearing due to start on October 31.