Suspended sentence for Bradley Goodwin after court hears former Stortford football club director was 'raised in a criminal family'

A BISHOP'S Stortford businessman who blamed his dead brother for a drug debt and branded his father a criminal in court has been spared jail after persuading a judge that setting up a cannabis factory and then going on the run for three years was<

Recorder Timothy Ashe QC said that he was "taking a risk, contrary to my better judgement" in giving Bradley Goodwin, 50, of Hare Street, near Buntingford, a suspended prison sentence.

Sitting at Chelmsford Crown Court today (Monday, July 14), said: "I am persuaded that this is an aberration, even though a serious one."

Goodwin had pleaded guilty in 2011 to being concerned in the production of 282 cannabis plants, said to be worth up to £500,000 if they had reached full yield, at a derelict house in Thaxted Road, Saffron Walden, on November 16, 2009. He also admitted possessing cannabis and a CS gas canister which police found at his home.

But he failed to attend court in July 2011 for sentencing and went on the run.

On May 20 this year he handed himself in to Chelmsford police station, saying his younger brother Charles had died and he wanted to be able to attend the funeral without fear of arrest.

Hertfordshire police are investigating the mysterious death of 36-year-old Charles, whose funeral was held last Monday (July 7). The father of one was found in London Road, Bishop's Stortford, in the early hours of Sunday, April 6,

Bradley Goodwin, pictured, a former director of Bishop's Stortford Football Club which was owned by his father John, also pleaded guilty to failing to surrender to bail. He told the court he spent his three years on the run staying with various friends in this country.

Today, the judge imposed an 11-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, ordered him to do 250 hours' unpaid work and told he must wear an electronic tag while observing a three-month 8pm-6am curfew. He also ordered him to pay £1,200 prosecution costs.

Recorder Ashe said that Goodwin's role in the cannabis farm was to fit insulation, air filtration and hydroponic systems. The plan was to convert four freight containers into cannabis factories. One had been completed, which was where the 282 plants were found when police acting on a tip-off raided the site.

The plants had not reached maturity but the estimated yield was between £22,000 and £500,000, the court heard.

Goodwin told police he got involved to pay off his own £1,800 drug debt to a man called "Rick".

But last month, Goodwin gave evidence to the judge that he had taken over his late brother Charles's £10,000 cocaine debt to wipe the slate clean. He said he had been threatened.

However, Recorder Ashe rejected Goodwin's claims, saying he found them "incredible".

Mitigating at today's sentencing hearing, Oliver Grimwood said that it could not be described as "duress light" as Goodwin made a conscious decision to go into the illegal enterprise.

The barrister said Goodwin had given evidence that his late father was a criminal and his brother had been associated with crime before he died.

"That had an effect on the defendant. From a young age he made a decision 'This will not be my life, I will not go down that route'."

Mr Grimwood said Goodwin was a successful businessman and this was an isolated incident. However, he fell foul of planning law when he ran a Stansted Airport parking operation at Woodside Park in Stortford without permission from East Herts District Council.

He had now started another business, as a "peer-to-peer broker", creating links between investors and small businesses, said the barrister.

"This was an isolated offence, a combination of desperation and making a stupid decision despite being raised in a criminal family, where his mother was kidnapped, and brought up in a family where he saw the very real face of crime," said Mr Grimwood.

"He is not a man who would turn to crime unless in his mind there was another alternative. He felt it was the only option he had to pay off the debt and to help his brother."

http://www.hertsandessexobserver.co.uk/News/Bishops-Stortford/Suspended-sentence-for-Bradley-Goodwin-after-court-hears-former-Stortford-football-club-director-was-raised-in-a-criminal-family-20140714155637.htm 15/07/2014