British fugitive ‘Skullcracker’ planned to flee to Ireland

An English bank-robber known as “The Skullcracker”, who went on the run after being left out from prison on day release, had wanted to set up a new life in Ireland, a court in Guildford in Surrey was told yesterday.

Michael Wheatley was sentence to life in jail after pleading guilty to robbery, possession of a firearm and being unlawfully at large from a Category D open prison on the Isle of Sheppey, Kent earlier this month.

Before he was recaptured, Wheatley, who inflicted a series of injuries in earlier bank-raids, robbed the Chelsea Building Society in Sunbury-on-Thames in Surrey on May 7 — a place he had robbed before, stealing £18,350.

“The plan was to start a new life in Ireland. Regrettably he committed a robbery to fund that new life,” his defence solicitor, Lionel Blackman told Guildford Crown Court, saying Wheatley has spent “46 of his 55 years in one institution or another”.

“Not seeing on the horizon another opportunity to determine his release and disappointed not to achieve a release at seven and a half years or in October, he made the decision not to return to prison at all,” he told the court.

Police had issued a warning that Wheatley — who appeared in court yesterday via a videolink from Belmarsh high-security — could have fled to Ireland, but he was eventually arrested in Tower Hamlets in East London after a UK-wide alert.