A security van robbery suspect – on the run for six years after a dramatic armed escape outside a courthouse – has been arrested in Holland, says Scotland Yard.
Remand prisoner Noel Cunningham, 48, escaped from a prison van along with Clifford Hobbs in June 2003 outside Inner London Crown Court where he was appearing on a charge of conspiring to steal £1.25 million from a Securicor van.
Cunningham was en route from Brixton Prison to the courthouse, near Elephant and Castle, when the van was ambushed by two armed men who shot the driver in the leg and pistol-whipped a guard.
He recently appeared on Scotland Yard’s 40 most-wanted list and was being hunted by the Serious Organised Crime Agency.
Cunningham was arrested in Amstelveen, Amsterdam, on September 8 and is in custody pending a court hearing on September 11.
He faces extradition to the U.K. where he will eventually have his long-overdue court appearance.
Hobbs stayed with friends in south London before fleeing on a fake passport to France, Portugal and eventually Malaga in Spain.
He was arrested and extradited to the UK in 2007 and was jailed for life in February last year after he admitted organising an 'inside job' on the security van in March 2003.
Officers, who had been tipped off about the raid, moved in as the van made a pick-up from a cafe in Effra Road in Brixton, south London.
Hobbs, from Rotherhithe, south east London, also admitted escaping from lawful custody and a jury at Woolwich Crown Court found him guilty of having a firearm with intent to escape from custody.
Soon after he went on the run Cunningham's mother urged her son to give himself up.
Speaking from her home in Rotherhithe, Margaret Cunningham said: 'He must give himself up. It's no good being on the run from the police.'
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