Shooting victim is jailed for refusing to help police

Martin Wainwright
The Guardian
Nov. 21, 2007

A shooting victim who repeatedly misled police because he was terrified about retribution from his attackers was jailed yesterday for perverting the course of justice.

Sanjeev Bhanot, who was almost killed when a bullet tore through his stomach a year ago, had to be helped to the court cells after a judge was told that he still refused to tell the truth about the incident in the north London suburb of Harrow.

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Sending the 29-year-old businessman to prison for three months, Judge Christopher Elwen said a prison sentence was essential "in the current circumstances of gun crime in London".

Bhanot's lies, which he persisted with in spite of terrible injuries, had left a serious crime unsolved and a firearm in the hands of criminals, he said.

Southwark crown court heard that Bhanot had given detectives a false name, age and address, and invented two different stories about the shooting and who was there at the time.

He was told by the judge: "You have rightly been accused of deliberately setting out to frustrate the investigation into a serious firearm incident."

Bhanot, of Southall, Middlesex, admitted the charge and was jailed for three months, in spite of a plea from defence counsel Julia Hackworth that prison would be "a very heavy penalty indeed".

The court heard that Bhanot had been in traction for four weeks while his injuries were treated in hospital and was still suffering from the after-effects of the shooting.

Detectives expected cooperation after doctors told Bhanot that a fractional change in the bullet's course would have wrecked his bowel and bladder, and "at the very least" left him paralysed for life.

But he first told them an invented story about an African-Caribbean man mugging him for jewellery and then blamed a "fugitive bookmaker" who had chased him for a gambling debt.

Bhanot finally said that he was sure cooperating with police would not only put his own life in renewed danger but also lay his whole family open to unspecified gangsters' revenge.

In a plea for leniency, Hackworth said her client, who spent eight hours in the operating theatre, was "a victim as well as the perpetrator of an offence, who has really suffered very heavily for the lies he has told".

Adam King, prosecuting, said police at one stage wondered if Bhanot had shot himself, after he claimed that no one was with him at the time.

But a 999 call tape recorded an unidentified friend telling the victim: "I have got to call an ambulance for you, mate. I have got to go now, bud."

The judge told the court: "It is important that those involved in gun crime, even as a victim, cooperate with the police for very obvious reasons. Also, when it comes to the court imposing a sentence, particularly in the current circumstances of gun crime in London, it must be a deterrent sentence."