'Farcical' armed raiders put Leeds couple through terrifying ordeal after busting into wrong home

In what was described as "farcical" during a sentencing hearing at Leeds Crown Court, Lee Galvin and an unnamed accomplice ransacked the mid-terrace home on Morley's Peel Street but then quickly left realising they had made a mistake.

Galvin was handed a seven-year jail sentence this week after admitting aggravated burglary.

Prosecutor Gareth Henderson-Moore said the unsuspecting couple had been at home on March 11 last year when they heard a knock on the door around 8.30pm. When one of them answered the door, the two men burst in wearing masks and brandishing the crowbars.

They ordered the occupants to get on the floor and kept shouting: "Where is the cash?"

The unnamed accomplice then went upstairs and carried out an untidy search. Out of frustration they threw one of the occupant's mobile phone, smashing it, before leaving.

Mr Henderson-Moore said: "It was clearly a pre-planned offence, targeting a certain address, but what is quite obvious is they got the wrong address. It was farcical."

Galvin, 42, was identified after a neighbour was able to take down the registration of the vehicle they were in. It was a hire car rented out by Galvin, and was also fitted with a tracker that put it on Peel Street at the time of the raid.

Galvin, of St James Drive, Horsforth, has 34 previous convictions for 100 offences that include burglaries. Mitigating on his behalf, John Bottomley said Galvin was an "habitual drug user at the time" and got himself into £4,500 worth of debt.

He added: "That's how he became involved in this offending, to pay it off. He has shown remorse and would like to apologise to the victims. He does not minimise the impact his offending will have had on them."

He said that Galvin was now drug-free and had even weaned himself off his methadone prescription.

Judge Nathan Adams told Galvin: "It must have been absolutely terrifying for those involved. You got the wrong house but that is no mitigation. I do not accept you were exploited, you got yourself into that position [the debt] and you were willing. It was planned but it was not planned very well."