Here we take a look at some of the criminals locked up during the first third of the year.
All of the information below comes from either Sussex Police or our reporters attending court in person.
41. Locked up in Sussex 2023: These are some of the criminals jailed between January and April
Three men from Hove who robbed and assaulted a teenager in a honey trap case have been jailed for a total of 81 months. Balint Besze, 20, of New Church Road (pictured); Theo Hallworth, 19, of Marine Avenue; and Reuben Willard, 19, of Hangleton Road; lured their victim to a derelict building where they carried out a sustained attack and stole his personal belongings. Following the incident, the victim, without money or shoes, was able to catch a bus to a friend’s house and report it to police. The motive for the incident stemmed from a spurious allegation against the victim made by a woman. Private messages on the victim’s Instagram account supported the case that this allegation was completely false. The woman relayed this false allegation to her friend Balint Besze. Photo: Sussex Police
42. Locked up in Sussex 2023: These are some of the criminals jailed between January and April
Besze and his two companions, Hallworth (pictured) and Willard, hatched a plot to exact revenge on the victim. They admitted their intention to force a confession, instead of establishing if there was any truth to the allegation or reporting it to police. They formed a vigilante group and one of their female friends persuaded the victim to meet her at a disused car workshop in Newtown Road, Hove, on the afternoon of March 26, 2021. This woman, now aged 19, spent a week engaging with the victim over social media and successfully lured him to the derelict building. Once inside, the young man was set upon by the three defendants, who wore boiler suits and masks and used metal sticks in their attack. The victim sustained bruising to his back, shoulder, wrist and forearm, and was forced to hand over his phone, wallet, passport, rucksack and even his shoes. The woman was arrested and charged in connection with the incident, however she was found not fit to plead due to her mental capacity. She was sectioned and reporting restrictions were imposed, meaning she cannot be identified. Photo: Sussex Police
43. Locked up in Sussex 2023: These are some of the criminals jailed between January and April
Besze, Willard (pictured) and Hallworth were arrested and charged with false imprisonment and robbery. They all admitted the offences in their police interviews, but claimed they did not use weapons in the attack. The case went for a Newton hearing and their claim was disproved. At Lewes Crown Court on February 15, they were each sentenced to 27 months’ imprisonment in a young offender institution. Investigating officer Rose Horan said: "These youths took it upon themselves to act as vigilantes in setting up a honey trap. The three defendants, who were of previous good character with bright futures ahead of them, now find themselves in prison for what is probably the biggest mistake they will ever make. The whole plot was ill conceived from the start. The victim was, and remains, absolutely traumatised by this incident and has shown great patience and maturity throughout the investigation.” Photo: Sussex Police
44. Locked up in Sussex 2023: These are some of the criminals jailed between January and April
A member of a county line drug dealing gang in Sussex has been jailed, Sussex Police has confirmed. Seyed Mousavian, 42, of Grand Parade in Brighton, was jailed for ten years at Lewes Crown Court on Thursday, March 23, after being found guilty of conspiracy to supply Class A drugs, police reported. Police said Mousavian is the tenth person jailed following a two-year investigation into the HECTOR county drugs line, identified as being behind the distribution of crack cocaine and heroin in Brighton and Hove. Since 2020, ten people involved in the HECTOR county line, including senior gang leaders, have been jailed for a total of more than 64 years, Sussex Police said. County lines dealing is the sale of drugs from large urban areas, such as London, into smaller towns and cities such as Brighton. Dealers and customers are linked by mobile phone numbers, through which deals are conducted. Typically the main number is controlled by a distant, senior gang member in the larger urban area, but the HECTOR line bucked that trend, police said. Instead, senior members operated within Sussex, giving investigators a greater opportunity to target offenders at all levels of the hierarchy. As is common practice for county lines dealing, the group targeted young and vulnerable individuals through violence, exploitation and intimidation, employing them to carry out street dealing on their behalf while higher level leaders maintained control of the money, Sussex Police said. During more than two years of covert and overt operations, surveillance, intelligence gathering and enforcement, dozens of people were arrested and huge amounts of drugs were seized as officers from the Community Investigations Team (CIT) partnered with the Metropolitan Police to disrupt the gang’s activity, police said. Sussex Police said the investigation found the HECTOR line changed phone numbers four times over four years. These numbers were found on the mobile phones of five people who died in drug-related circumstances between 2018 and 2020. Photo: Sussex Police