Gangster gets life sentence

A gangster has been jailed for life for gunning down a male model who may have been trying to foil a building society robbery in Birmingham.

Lynton Fletcher was convicted of murder by a 10-2 majority verdict yesterday following a trial which heard how former Walsall student and Clothes Show Live! model Joseph Nwabuko was shot at close range outside the Nationwide.

He was shot after Fletcher returned from a getaway vehicle to open fire near New Street station. Passing sentence on Fletcher, who was convicted of conspiracy to rob the previous day, Mr Justice Ouseley said: "This was cold and brutal."

Fletcher, who used vehicle tracking devices to target cash delivery vans, will be sentenced on the conspiracy charge and told the minimum period he must serve in jail in December.

Mr Nwabuko, aged 28, who had moved from Beechdale to a flat near the scene of the Bullring robbery, had come face to face with a three-strong gang on the day of his death in February 2004. They were fleeing with cash boxes after targeting a security van which had been re-filling a cashpoint.

Fletcher, 27, from Nechells, Birmingham, had made thousands of pounds from numerous robberies across the West Midlands.

Speaking after the verdict, Mr Nwabuko's brother Johnson said: "My family has been through nearly four years of suffering but I hope he can now rest in peace. I thank the police for never giving up in seeking justice for Joseph."