Two men have been jailed for more than 20 years after terrorising hotels across the capital with guns and stealing thousands of pounds.
The men first robbed a hotel in Southwark Bridge Road, Southwark, on January 3, 2022.
They entered the hotel in the early hours of the morning with their faces covered and threatened two members of staff with a gun, forcing them into a back office.
From left, Ghislain Kiamuangana and Dymtro Shcherbinskyy were both found guilty of robbery and firearm offences (Picture: The Met)
The employees’ legs and hands were tied and they were forced to provide the combination to a safe. After ransacking the tills and safe the men stole around £4,000.
The robbers had used a stolen white Sprinter van with cloned number plates which was caught on CCTV – the Met said later in the investigation this proved a vital piece of evidence.
Six days later, a further robbery was attempted at a hotel in Canning Town but the staff member was unable to gain access to the safe.
On January 14, 2022, a third robbery attempt took place at a hotel in the City. An employee was held at gunpoint while the two men stole £3,000. CCTV showed the same van being used but again on different number plates, with the suspects wearing the same clothing.
Dymtro Shcherbinskyy, 42, of Blossom Close, Romford and Ghislain Kiamuangana, 34, of no fixed address, were jailed today for a total of 22 years for the robberies, following a trial at Snaresbrook Crown Court.
Kiamuangana, was sentenced to 10 years in prison which included a sentence for theft, after stealing £12,000 from a safe, while working at a hotel in 2021.
Shcherbinskyy was identified following extensive CCTV and automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) enquiries, which led detectives to the discovery of a stolen Sprinter being filled up in December 2021 at a petrol station in Lakeside, Essex.
Following the identification of Shcherbinskyy, Met detectives carried out a street trawl around Romford as they believed he was staying in the area, and they found the Sprinter van outside an address.
Eventually, a meeting was observed between Shcherbinskyy and Kiamuangana – the gunman – in a block of flats in Greenwich. Two firearm warrants were executed at their known addresses and they were both arrested.
A CO2 powered air gun and relevant clothing were seized from Kiamuangana’s address. Live rounds of ammunition, the stolen van and numerous sets of number plates were found at Shcherbinskyy’s address.
The CO2 powered air gun seized from Kiamuangana’s address (Picture: The Met)
Detective Sergeant Lee Warrington, from the Met’s Flying Squad, said: “Combining forces to capture these two criminals was absolutely essential, and the detectives on the team used a range of specialist techniques to bring the offending to a halt as quickly as possible. Our objective was to stop anyone else coming to harm.
“The effect of such crime on individuals long after court cases come to a close cannot be understated and I would like to commend the bravery of the victims who suffered a truly disturbing ordeal at the hands of these men.
“Thanks to the dedicated work of the officers involved in this operation, a firearm and live ammunition were taken off the streets, and two dangerous criminals have been brought to justice.”
Pictured top: Dymtro Shcherbinskyy and Ghislain Kiamuangana were both jailed for robbing hotels (Picture: The Met)
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