'Immature' youth behind bars after sharing footage of cable theft which left residents homeless

Kyle Butters, 20, filmed the masked gang, who were equipped with bolt-cutters and hard hats as they cut through cables to steal copper wiring at the Yorkshire apartment block. Footage, which he then shared on social media, shows masked youths on crosser bikes removing and posing with the stolen wire from the basement of the flats.

The gang stripped out copper wiring worth about £15,000 and caused a mass evacuation of the building, in Bradford, by damaging its power supply. At the time of the theft, which occurred last April, some residents were forced to sleep in cars while others slept on friends' floor or sofas or had to move into hotels.

West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service said the power outage caused by the theft affected safety systems, such as fire alarms, emergency lighting and sprinklers. Bradford Crown Court heard a subsequent an insurance claim currently stood at £300,000 due to the additional damage it caused.

Police launched an investigation into the theft and discovered the footage had been shared on social media and traced it back to Butters. He pleaded guilty to being involved in the burglary on the basis that he'd been acting under instructions and was there to assist with moving the already stripped out wiring.

But Recorder Simon Jackson KC said it was a 'very serious burglary' and Butters would have been aware of the scale of what he was involved in. The judge said Butters had been "a willing participant" and it would have been obvious that it was a well-planned and well-equipped targeted burglary.

Butters, who had no previous convictions, was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in a young offender institution.

He told him: "The loss here has been substantial. There was the financial loss of the copper wiring. There was additional damage and the insurance claim is of the order of £300,000."

Recorder Jackson said the team of burglars had come in under the cover of darkness and Butters had been linked to the uploading of the TikTok clip "glamourising" the offence.

He added: "There were people with bolt-croppers. There were people with hard hats. These were people who knew what they were doing and you played a subsidiary role in a very serious operation. You were young. You were immature, but it would have been obvious to you what you were getting into."

Prosecutor Jessica Lister said burglary gang had forced open doors into the basement area of the premises and had caused a significant amount of damage. The offending was discovered the next day when residents reported a power cut and the police and fire service attended.

Miss Lister submitted that it had been a dangerous offence because the intruders had tampered with live wiring and the consequences could have been much more severe.

Barrister Dan Lee, for Butters, said the penny had finally started to drop as to the consequences suffered by those people who lived in the flats.

He said: "He certainly now understands the impact caused to them, the distress and the financial consequences."

Mr Lee said a pre-sentence report indicated that Butters would have been easily influenced by his associates and he was not the brains behind the operation. He said Butters had gone to the premises with friends and had been offered a financial incentive to help move the wiring.

He added: "The first time he had knowledge of what was happening was when he was in the basement."