Teen Wakefield burglar confesses to judge before being jailed : 'I have wasted my life'
A teenage burglar told a judge he needed to “break the cycle” of offending, admitting that he is “wasting his life”.
Mason Birch was jailed this week for a long list of crimes, including eight attempted burglaries and two burglaries - one of which he threatened a terrified couple in bed with a machete and hammer.
The 19-year-old was given a five-year sentence, but in a letter he penned to the judge at Leeds Crown Court, he made a plea for leniency.
Read out by his barrister, James Littlehales, Birch wrote: “I understand these are serious offences and I do not take that lightly.
“I know I have caused fear and harm to others. I can only imagine how the victims must have felt.
“It’s about the life I have wasted and the people I have hurt along the way. If I do not change, I will lose everything.
“I need to be the one to break the cycle.”
Birch broke into two homes in two days in May, firstly smashing his way into a house and confronting a couple, demanding to know where their safe was and waving the machete and hammer around.
They handed over the device from the top of the wardrobe which contained £2,000 in cash and £5,000 worth of jewellery. Birch and his accomplice also took the couple’s Seat Ibiza parked outside.
He then broke into a house a day later and stole an Audi car.
In June, he and two others tried to break into eight homes in the space of two hours in the Ackworth area.
They were disturbed each time, and Birch even beat one resident with a baton after he confronted him, demanding he hand over his car keys.
Birch, of Burton Street, South Elmsall, has multiple previous convictions, including burglaries.
After sentencing, Detective Sergeant Jessica Arblaster, of Wakefield District Crime Team, said: “Birch is a prolific offender who has been responsible for a number of burglaries, including an aggravated burglary where he threatened people in their own home with weapons.
“He was apprehended by sustained community policing efforts and partnership working.
“Your home is somewhere you should feel safe, and we know the concern it causes not just to victims but also to the wider public when we have burglary and attempted burglary offences.
“Birch is now behind bars, and I hope that this provides some reassurance to the victims in these incidents and others living in these communities.”