Heartless thieves tricked blind pensioner with fake ambulance as wife lay dying
Steven Morris, 45, and Kelly Cassidy, 42, have been jailed for duping an elderly man into believing they were calling for an ambulance. Instead, they stole from him
04:46, 10 MAR 2021
Updated
Ronald Crowther ran for help as wife Dorothy lay dying (Image: Janet Crowther-Hindley / SWNS)
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But Burnley Crown Court heard the pair were arrested two days later and charged with burglary.
Yesterday, the yobs were jailed for a combined total of over six years after admitting the charge.
Morris was sentenced to four years and three months in custody, while Cassidy was jailed for two and a half years.
Cassidy will spend two and a half years in jail (Image: Lancashire Police)
The burglars were caught on camera moments before the crime (Image: Lancashire Police) This was a shocking and despicable crime committed against elderly victims at a time when they were at their most vulnerable and in need of urgent help.
Despicable Burnley burglars targeted dying woman s home bbc.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from bbc.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
BURGLARS took a dying woman’s phone and purse after the 84-year-old’s frantic husband had asked them for help. Kelly Cassidy and Steven Morris walked into partially-sighted Ronald Crowther’s home as he was upstairs caring for his dying wife Dorothy, who had fallen ill in the night on October 15. The heroin addicts seized the opportunity to strike after seeing a distressed Mr Crowther looking for help in the street at around 3am – even offering to call an ambulance when he told them his wife was ill. But the pair never called an ambulance. Instead they waited until the coast was clear to enter Mr Crowther’s Brierfield home.
A GANG of career criminals terrorised people in their own homes by breaking in and threatening to kill them before escaping with low-value items and cash. In one instance a vulnerable man’s phone line was cut by the thugs so he would be unable to call for help as they threatened to slit his throat. The burglary and robbery spree undertaken by Jamie Lonsdale, Mark Swain and James ‘Bronco’ Doherty took place in April 2019 in Accrington. The trio have now been jailed for a total of more than 30 years after Swain and Lonsdale were deemed to be dangerous offenders.