A BANK robber who helped get himself caught after blowing some of his ill-gotten gains on a luxury holiday has been jailed for more than 10 years.
Russell Snowdon and an accomplice teamed up to blast open a cash machine at an RBS branch in Langholm, Dumfries-shire.
The 42-year-old later jetted out to Gambia in Africa for a two week getaway with his lover. He had paid for the £1,700 trip in cash days after the November 2016 raid.
Staff at an English-based travel agent spotted the bank notes were all Scottish – but Snowdon claimed he had just sold a car there.
The convicted killer, latterly of Co Durham, was held by police shortly after he landed back in the UK.
He was back at the High Court in Glasgow after last week pleading guilty to a number of charges including stealing £45,080 from the RBS.
Snowdon yesterday admitted trying to break out from Dumfries jail while on remand in March this year.
Lady Dorrian jailed him for a total of about eightand-a-half years for the robbery offences.
The judge added a further two years for the prison escape bid. She pointed out Snowdon already had a string of convictions for “violence and dishonesty”.
T he R B S r obb er y occurred around 1.40am last November 11.
CCTV showed an explosion which burst open the ATM. A figure is spotted climbing in a broken window and handing bundles of cash out to his accomplice in the street.
Snowdon was previously jailed for the manslaughter of a grandfather and for his role in an armed robbery
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here