'Singing Defective' is back behind bars

Dean English was jailed for ten years in November 2004 for causing the death of a teenage boy by dangerous driving.

The sentence was reduced to nine years on appeal because of English’s still young age, at 23.

Ian Gourley, 15, died when he was hit by a car taken by English and driven over a grassy area, known locally as the Pony Field in Peterlee, County Durham, in November 2003.

English failed to stop, driving away before setting the car on fire.

A jury at Durham Crown Court found him guilty of causing death by dangerous driving and arson.

English was already wellknown to police in Peterlee as a repeat juvenile offender, nicknamed “The Singing Defective”

for his high-pitched responses to questioning as a teenager.

By the time of his 2004 conviction, he had 73 offences on his record.

English was released on licence in November 2009 and kept out of trouble until his arrest in February, when his fingerprint was found on a bag containing a laptop computer found in a car in Peterlee.

The laptop was among items stolen in a burglary at a house in Brierville, Durham City, in January.

When English was arrested after the fingerprint match was confirmed, he admitted having touched the bag when offered the laptop for sale.

Now aged 29, and of Bradley Street, Easington Colliery, English denied burglary of the house in Durham City, and at a property, in Broom Hill Terrace, Hetton-le-Hole, both in January. He admitted a charge of handling stolen goods.

Jamie Adams, in mitigation, said English avoided offending for 14 months after his release on licence and merely touched the bag containing the laptop on examining it when offered it for sale, which he turned down.

Mr Adams said English has been in custody since his arrest in February.

Judge Richard Lowden, who jailed English in 2004, imposed an eight-month sentence, to include the time already spent in custody.

The two counts of burglary were left to lie on the file.