Robber told to pay back cash
A violent armed robber who made more than £1 million from crime has been ordered to pay back less than a quarter of his ill-gotten gains.
Vivian Gilling, who is serving an 18-year jail term for robbery and burglary, was found to have profited from his terrifying two-year crimewave in Bath and Wiltshire to the tune of £1.15 million.
But a judge at Swindon Crown Court believed the 43-year-old professional criminal, who is known as Billy Gilling, when he said he now had no more than £240,500.
He will have to sell his home in Southwick near Trowbridge, to settle the debt or face a further two-year prison sentence.
Gilling was brought back to court to face a confiscation hearing under the Proceeds of Crime Act over his raids on post offices and an auction house.
It was agreed between the prosecution and defence that he benefited from his criminal lifestyle by £1.15 million.
Adam Vaitilingam, for the Crown, asked the court to order the repayment of the full amount - suggesting Gilling had squirreled away vast sums.
Referring to covert evidence obtained by bugging the robber´s home, he said Gilling had been aware of the new confiscation laws and had stashed money away which would never be found.
But Robin Shellard, for Gilling, said thieves could sell stolen items only at a cut-price rate.
Gilling was given six months to make the payment or face an extension to his two-year term.
His partner in crime Gerald Burrell, of Trowbridge, who admitted conspiracy to rob and conspiracy to burgle, was found to have profited from crime by £80,000 and order to pay a nominal £1.
Should either man come into money in the future, he can be ordered to repay more cash.
Gilling was convicted of conspiracy to rob and conspiracy to burgle following a five-week trial last year.
He was also convicted of robbing and burgling a string of post offices as well as the £330,000 armed robbery of the Gardiner Houlgate auction house at Corsham in 2005.
In that offence he and another man were armed with sawn-off shotguns when they lay in wait for workers at the firm on the Leafield Industrial Estate.
Two staff were tied and gagged after one was forced at gunpoint to take the robbers to safes loaded with jewels and cash.
That offence came eight months after Burrell had been arrested for robbing the Woodrow Road post office in Melksham.
That raid, in November 2004, was the last in a series of 11 robberies and burglaries over 18 months at post offices in west Wiltshire, Bath and Somerset.
Courtesy of The Bath Chronicle