{"id":5754,"date":"2011-12-09T12:26:56","date_gmt":"2011-12-09T12:26:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tat.reddaisytrading.co.uk\/index.php\/2011\/12\/09\/two-jailed-for-mosque-attack\/"},"modified":"2011-12-09T12:26:56","modified_gmt":"2011-12-09T12:26:56","slug":"two-jailed-for-mosque-attack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/2011\/12\/09\/two-jailed-for-mosque-attack\/","title":{"rendered":"Two jailed for Mosque attack"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Ten year sentences for Simon Beech and Garreth Foster<\/h3>\n
TWO men have been found guilty of arson and jailed for a total of 20 years in prison following a fire at a mosque in Stoke-on-Trent.<\/strong><\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

Simon Beech, 23, and Garreth Foster, 29, both from Stoke-on-Trent, were convicted of arson following the incident at the mosque in Regent Road, Hanley, last December.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

Following a four-day trial at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court the men were sentenced to ten years each in prison.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

A detailed police investigation was launched by the force\u2019s Major Investigations Department (MID) following the incident, which included a detailed forensic examination of the scene, a comprehensive review of CCTV coverage in the area, house to house inquiries and taking in excess of 100 witness statements.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

The court heard the deliberate attempt to start the fire did not cause any structural damage at the mosque, although smoke did cause some damage to the interior.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

Chief Inspector Jeff Moore, commander of Stoke-on-Trent Central Local Policing Team (LPT), said: \u201cThe sentences are to be welcomed and send out a clear message \u2013 this kind of criminal act will not be tolerated in Staffordshire.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cFollowing the fire numerous meetings were held between local neighbourhood police officers and members of the community to keep them informed of our investigation and to address their concerns.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was comforting to see that in such difficult and upsetting circumstances the community pulled together and that is still very much the case today. In fact just a short time after the incident local people gathered together for a community clean-up which helped to boost spirits.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough this was a serious incident, it was an isolated one. It is not a reflection of the good community relationships we have within Stoke-on-Trent.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will continue to work with all our communities to maintain these relationships and together with our partners we are committed to tackling, and driving down, all incidents of hate crime \u2013 which have no place in today\u2019s society.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will listen to any concerns and do everything in our power to address them and provide reassurance.\u201d<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/div>\n

\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ten year sentences for Simon Beech and Garreth Foster TWO men have been found guilty of arson and jailed for a total of 20 years in prison following a fire at a mosque in Stoke-on-Trent. Simon Beech, 23, and Garreth Foster, 29, both from Stoke-on-Trent, were convicted of arson following the incident at the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11753,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5754\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}