Essex: TOWIE Stars' Stepfather Jailed

The Only Way Is Essex sisters Sam and Billie Faiers wrote to a judge to try to save their stepfather, who is from Brentwood, from prison.

But their plea did not stop an Old Bailey judge jailing David Chatwood for the equivalent of four years after he pleaded guilty to conspiracy to steal £1 million-worth of gold and silver bullion from a lorry in Belgium in October last year.

Judge Richard Hone said he had read a letter from Chatwood, 58, and "also a letter from his daughters who find him helpful in their shops'' but this would not alter his sentence because Chatwood was a principal organiser of the theft.

Judge Hone said that with time served since pleading guilty in April, Chatwood would serve two years and nine months, after being recalled to prison because he was on licence from a 2001 sentence of 12 years for drugs and firearms offences.

The sisters, who live with their parents in Sawyers Grove, Brentwood, left court posing for photographers but refusing to comment.

Brian Mulcahay, 46, of Grosvenor Road, Westcliff-on-Sea, was jailed for three years and six months.

Stanley Rose, 75, of Iver, Pilgrims Hatch, Brentwood, was jailed for four years.

David Gale, 55, of Hansells Mead, Harlow, and Gary Cummings, 51, of Anne Way, Ilford, were each jailed for three years.

John Corley, 53, of Tankerton Road, Whitstable, Kent, was given six years.

A seventh man, Matthew Middleton, 42, of Crows Road, Epping, also pleaded guilty and will be sentenced at a later date.