April 30, 2020 11.15 am This story is over 48 months old

Grimsby criminals jailed over arson, drug and violent offences

One of the men was sentenced twice

These men were all sentenced for crimes in Grimsby. Photo: Humberside Police

Four Grimsby men have been jailed for a range of offences, including two who were sentenced for setting fire to a family’s home as they slept.

The men were all given jail terms of over five years during the last two weeks.

One criminal, Benjamin Day, was behind two serious cases.

Arson attack whilst family slept

Corey Ford and Benjamin Day. Photo: Humberside Police

Corey Ford, 23, of no fixed abode, and Benjamin Day, 28 of David Street, worked together to set fire to the home of a Grimsby family and have been jailed for a total of 11-and-a-half years.

Humberside Police said the targeted attack happened in the early hours of April 10, 2019 when Ford was driven to the terraced property in Farebrother Street by Day.

CCTV captured Ford getting out of the car, dousing the front door with petrol from a green jerry can and setting it alight. The pair then drove away from the scene.

The family awoke to the sound of the smoke alarm and their dog barking and were able to escape without anyone being injured.

Ford and Day both admitted arson when they appeared before Grimsby Crown Court on April 24.

Ford was jailed for six years. Day was jailed for five-and-a-half years, to run consecutively to a separate 42 month sentence for drug offences.

Drug dealers

Rod Woollis and Benjamin Day. Photo: Humberside Police

Benjamin Day was also one half of a duo responsible for selling cocaine and heroin on the streets of Grimsby, sentenced for a total of seven-and-a-half years.

Day and Rod Woollis, 28, of Mendip Avenue in Scartho were arrested when police teams carried out simultaneous raids on their properties on February 6, 2020.

At Day’s home, 296g of heroin with an estimated street value of almost £15,000 was found hidden in a toilet. A quantity of cocaine was found on a windowsill. Mobile phones linked to the drug dealing operation were seized from Woollis’ home and he was jailed for six years.

When the men appeared at Grimsby Crown Court on April 24 they both admitted being concerned in the supply of the two class A drugs.

Violent offender

Vincas Baltrusaitis. Photo: Humberside Police

Vincas Baltrusaitis, who is currently serving a 14-year prison sentence for grievous bodily harm, was jailed for a further five-and-a-half years.

The 32-year-old Lithuanian man was originally jailed in July 2011 after pleading guilty to assaulting a man in Selby. He was released and deported back to Lithuania under the Early Removal Scheme in 2017, with the condition that he could not return to the UK prior to December 2024 when his full prison sentence would have been served.

Baltrusaitis was recalled to prison in March to serve the remaining seven years of the sentence after Humberside Police teams received intelligence he had returned to the UK using false identification.

He was arrested on Bentley Street in Grimsby before appearing before Grimsby Crown Court on April 27. He admitted further offences of possession of cocaine with intent to supply, possession of false identity documents and entering the UK in breach of a deportation order.

Humberside Police’s teams seized fake identity documents and assets totalling £90,000 under the Proceeds of Crime Act.