Drug dealer who hid gun in bin loses sentence appeal

Harpriat Singh Dyal, 47, of Foleshill Road, Foleshill, was jailed at Birmingham Crown Court in February last year

A Coventry drug dealer who hid a pistol in his dustbin can have no complaints about his tough 11-year sentence, senior judges have ruled.

Harpriat Singh Dyal, 47, of Foleshill Road, Foleshill, was jailed at Birmingham Crown Court in February last year.

Jurors convicted him of having heroin and cocaine with intent to supply and possessing a prohibited weapon.

Dyal was prosecuted after police raided his home in June 2015, discovering assorted “wraps” of hard drugs.

Outside in his dustbin they found a .22 air pistol which had been adapted to fire live cartridges, said Mr Justice Spencer

“It was a real gun capable of firing live ammunition,” the judge told London’s Appeal Court.

Dyal was sentenced on the basis that he was “the keeper of the gun rather than its user”.

But the weapon had been “sourced for use in connection with the drugs trade”, the judge said.

Dyal was trusted to “store” the weapon and “played a significant role in the supply of drugs”.

“He must have had some knowledge of the scale of the operation,” added the judge.

Dyal’s lawyers challenged his sentence, claiming the trial judge wrongly labelled him a street dealer.

But Mr Justice Spencer, sitting with Lord Justice Davis and Judge Munro QC, threw out his complaints.

“We can’t accept that submission. The trial judge was well placed to assess Dyal’s role,” he concluded.

“These offences called for the severe sentence which the judge rightly passed.”

Nothing more than a try-on, a gravy train for the legal "profession". This appeal had little chance of success, but was allowed to go ahead at (presumably) our expense. It's time that the legal "profession" were stopped wasting tax payers money like this. Maybe on failure to secure a successful appeal, the legal bods only ought be awarded provable expenses rather than their over-inflated fees?