Released prisoner robbed teenage boy in Leeds city centre minutes after probation meeting

Rio Donegan shamelessly crossed the street and targeted the boy, punching him multiple times and then stealing his bag before walking away.

An appeal was launched by police to find him with the incident caught on city-centre CCTV.

Leeds Crown Court heard that 20-year-old Donegan had been previously held in youth detention after serving a 35-month sentence for robbery.

On February 14 of this year, he attended his appointment in relation to his release from that sentence.

After finishing, he left and at around 2.40pm he crossed the road on George Street near to the city’s bus station and pushed the unsuspecting 16-year-old victim against a wall.

He began punching him, connecting three or four times to his head, prosecutor Robert Galley told the court.

He said to the boy’s friend: “Do you want some as well?”

Donegan then picked up the boy’s dropped bag and walked towards the indoor market. The bag contained items worth around £300, including a mobile phone.

Police released CCTV photos hours later asking for members of the public to get in touch to help identify the culprit.

Donegan, of no fixed address, was arrested around 10 days later and held on remand in HMP Doncaster, from where he appeared in court via video link this week.

Mitigating, Harriet Eglinton said the attack was a “cry for help” after his prison release, but Judge Andrews Stubbs KC interjected and said: “He had just come from probation but did not mention it there.”

Ms Eglinton said Donegan now had remorse and recognised he needed help, adding: “He knows it’s wrong to commit these offences and is willing to be on the path to rehabilitation.”

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Again, Judge Stubbs disagreed and said there was little remorse on display and that it was “everybody else’s fault” rather than Donegan’s.

Addressing the defendant directly he said: “It’s a horrible crime, senseless violence in the middle of the day with people about. You just stroll across the road and beat a young boy to the ground. You take his bag and disappear.

“You say it’s a cry for help - you had just walked away from a probation appointment. It seems to me if you were really seeking help, that’s where you would have found it.

“But it’s a worrying theme that it’s everybody else’s fault but yours. Nobody cares or listens [you say], it’s all about you.”

He gave Donegan three years’ detention in a young offender institute and warned him if he did not change, he would continue to receive longer sentences.