Man convicted over €50k heist previously caught after leaving Air Max at crime scene
Leon Sharlott is already serving six years over the seizure of two guns in Wexford in 2018.
Leon Sharlott, 33, previously of Compass Court North, Royal Canal Park, Ashtown, Dublin 15, appeared at Mullingar Circuit Criminal this week after pleading pleaded guilty to the robbery of a GSLS Security employee of a cash box containing €50,000 on June 13, 2019, at Main Street, Kinnegad, Co Westmeath.Mullingar Gardai traded Sharlott’s movements in a 5-Seires BMW with fake plates to a warehouse in Dublin while their colleagues at Store Street in Dublin discovered Sharlott has been putting hundreds of dye-stained notes into betting machines in bookmakers in Dublin’s inner city.Dye had exploded onto the notes when the gang cut open the cash box.Judge Keenan Johnson adjourned sentencing until November.Sharlott is already serving six years over the seizure of two guns in Wexford in 2018.He was dubbed the “Cinderella gunman” after he was tied to the weapons by DNA from a pair of Nike Air Max he left at the scene.Garda raided on a council yard on the outskirts of Gorey and seized a black Glock semi-automatic pistol and a silver-coloured .38 calibre revolver on March 15, 2018.They found a Volkswagen Golf, along with a Volkswagen Jetta and a Nissan Qashqai, with three men present.One of the three, Gerard Byrne was detained on the spot, while a second, Daniel Delaney, was arrested a few hours later after breaking into a camper van parked in nearby Ramsgate Village.The third man, later identified as Sharlott escaped, but was arrested two months later when his DNA found on a pair of Air Max runners in one of the cars used by the gang.Sharlott pleaded not guilty. But, alongside the DNA, crucial to the case was a photograph showing the defendant with part of his ear missing, which matched evidence given by a man who gave him a lift on his way back to Dublin after the Garda operation.The same defect with his ear, since repaired, could be seen on CCTV footage painstakingly collected from various locations.The footage showed Sharlott preparing to come to Gorey or making his escape from the scene after eluding gardaí on the night in question.Gardaí across Leinster were in a state of heightened alert at the time the weapons were seized due to a series of ongoing gun attacks and murders linked to the Hutch/Kinahan feud.A noticeable chunk measuring 3cm in length and 1.5 cm wide was bitten off Sharlott’s ear in an attack in a row at a carnival in Parnell Park in 2017.Nine months after the gun seizure Sharlott was a getaway driver for a cash-in-transit robbery outside Bank of Ireland in Kinnegad.The security man was making a delivery when two men standing at a nearby bus stop came across with their faces covered and wearing gloves."One was carrying a hammer, and the other had what appeared to be an iron bar," said Detective Garda Reynolds.They demanded he "leave the fucking box", which he dropped.The security man, who did not have to give evidence, said in his statement to gardai that "I feared for my life".The pair got into a gold-coloured Renault car on the far side of the road and drove off, followed by Sharlott in a blue BMW.The court heard he had 10 prior criminal convictions and was given a six year sentence in 2022 for the Wexford firearm offences in 2018.In 2016, he received a three-year suspended sentence for assault causing harm after he paid compensation.His other convictions were for motoring offences.
