London, Aug.28 (ANI): A man who posed as a James Bond movie maker and acted as a front for running Britain’’s biggest underworld armoury, supplied a machine gun linked to the murder of Police Constable Sharon Beshenivsky. Grant Wilkinson, 33, was convicted on Wednesday for supplying guns used in more than 50 shootings and murders in the past three years, reports The Telegraph.
He is said to have converted replica Mac-10 “spray and pray” weapons in a shed in a Berkshire village and supplied them to criminal gangs across the country.
One of the machine guns was linked to the killing of Beshenivsky in West Yorkshire in 2005.
The other victims were all in London and included Michael Dosunmu, the 15-year-old who was shot dead in his bedroom by a gang after being mistaken for his brother.
Wilkinson converted 90 of the weapons, which he had brought from a legitimate arms supplier after claiming to be working on a new James Bond film.
Police chiefs said he had set up a business producing weapons “solely for killing”. He used the cash from selling the guns to dine at top restaurants and stay at luxury hotels, police sources said.
Forensic experts, who spent a total of four years in man-hours on the case, analyzed every shooting in Britain where distinctive Mac-10 spent cartridges were found at the scene.
Detectives believe that the guns were used in a total of 51 gun-related crimes, including 24 non-fatal shootings and eight homicides.
A further 40 machine guns had not been recovered and police are appealing for gangs to hand them in. (ANI)