Preston thug Declan Carroll jailed for role in gang attack at railway station
A gang of thugs dressed in all black carried out a vicious attack on two passengers waiting for a train at Preston Railway Station, a court heard.
One of the travellers narrowly escaped being stabbed after running into the station and onto a footbridge across the tracks.
The other stood his ground at the main entrance and tried to fight off his assailants, Judge Ian Unsworth was told.
Jailing 26-year-old Declan Carroll for his part in the brawl Judge Unsworth hit out at a delay of more than three-and-a-half years in bringing the case to court.
He revealed that because the attack happened in January 2021 and Carroll had since been jailed for four years for another violent offence in March 2022, he would have to impose a lesser overall prison term than the case merited.
He told prosecuting barrister Megan Cox he had found himself “in a ludicrous position” because of the lengthy hold-up bringing the case before him.
“The sentence today will be drastically reduced to what it would have been,” said Judge Unsworth. “I have to have due regard to the principle of totality.”
Miss Cox told the court that Carroll, of Colman Court, Broadgate, but currently serving a sentence at HMP Lancaster Farms, had pleaded guilty to a charge of affray. He also admitted possessing snap bags of cocaine and cannabis which were found by police at his home.
Carroll was one of a number of men who accosted the two victims at the entrance to the railway station. The two men had come to Preston from Chorley to meet friends in the city and had been having a smoke outside the entrance to the station while they waited for their train.
Suddenly they saw a group, dressed all in black, approaching in a threatening manner and with their hands in their pockets as if to indicate they had weapons.
One of the men ran into the station and some of the group chased after him, while the rest, including Carroll, attacked the other man who remained outside the entrance.
The man who ran into the station had a fight with two of the gang, one of whom tried several times to stab him, lunging at him with a knife.
Carroll grabbed the one outside and put him in a headlock as the others punched him. He threw some punches at his attackers to protect himself.
The court heard that the attacker with the knife had already been dealt with in Preston Crown Court.
Carroll is currently serving a prison sentence for his involvement in an attack in Grafton Street, Preston, five months after the station assault, in which a man was left lying in the street with a knife sticking out of his back.
The man who stabbed the victim in broad daylight, Jordan Bailey, was jailed for six years for wounding and possessing an offensive weapon.
Carroll was given a total of four years for threatening someone with a weapon in a public place. His sentence also included a previous assault in 2019 and two counts of criminal damage.
Judge Unsworth was told he is due to be released from that sentence on November 7 this year.
Defence barrister Mark Stephenson said his client had been recalled to prison twice on charges which were never proceeded with. “He has spent a long, long time on recall which should never have taken place,” he said. “He has effectively been left to sit in prison.”
Judge Unsworth told the prosecution he had asked for an explanation from the Crown Prosecution Service as to why it had taken so long to get the current case before a court.
He said the affray case arose from the group of men “bringing public disorder in and outside Preston Railway Station.”
Carroll, he said, had been one of those involved outside the station and had been seen on CCTV to get one of the victims in a head lock while others were attacking him.
“That is the extent of his involvement. (But) anyone bringing violence of this kind and with a knife is a serious matter.
“The offences occurred in January 2021 . . . remarkably with a Crown Court judge being asked to sentence in the summer of 2024, even more remarkably when the defendant has been the subject of a four-year sentence, released and recalled and has been waiting for these matters (to be dealt with).”
He sentenced Carroll to five months in jail for the affray charge, two months for possession of cocaine and one month for cannabis, all to run concurrently with his current prison term, meaning no additional time in custody.
“The overall effect of this is that had the defendant been before the court in 2022 he would have been sentenced to four years and five months in prison.”