Operator receives custodial sentence over criminal damage.
A digger driver who caused a “trail of destruction” at a new hotel because he was owed £600 in wages has been jailed for five years and four months.
John Manley drove a digger through the front doors of a brand new Travelodge in Liverpool in January last year, alleging he had not been paid.
Videos of the incident, which caused damage to the hotel worth more than £443,000, went viral online and showed colleagues asking Manley to stop as he shouted: “All you had to do was pay me.”
Sentencing him, Judge David Aubrey QC said: “You were intent on maximum damage and you intended to leave a trail of destruction.”
He said Manley, who pleaded guilty on the first day of his trial last September to damaging property being reckless as to whether life is endangered, having earlier admitted criminal damage, caused “destruction in the extreme” and put the safety of those inside and outside the building at risk.
Two colleagues eventually managed to disconnect the fuel line to the vehicle, leaving one of them temporarily blinded after diesel sprayed into his face, and Manley jumped out of the vehicle and scaled a 10ft wire fence to flee the scene.
Mark Sharman, defending, said the father-of-two could not afford electricity or to buy food because he had not been paid, and therefore could not have his children, aged six and 11, to stay.
