Rotherham man jailed for firearms possession

Richard Riley was arrested at his home in March

A Rotherham man found in possession of several illegal firearms has been jailed.

Richard Riley, 49, of Lovetot Avenue, was found guilty of eight firearms offences on 12 September.

Riley had been linked forensically to three of six converted pistols found in a container in Sheffield in September 2022, South Yorkshire Police said, with another found near his home.

He was jailed for 12 years at a hearing at Sheffield Crown Court on Thursday.

The weapons had been recovered along with 72 rounds of ammunition from a container in the Beighton area of Sheffield in September 2022, police said.

Riley was arrested when firearms officers executed a warrant at his home in March.

'Loaded and viable'

A converted blank-firing, self-loading pistol was then recovered from a neighbour's lawn along with five modified 9mm cartridges. It was similar to the weapons previously found in Sheffield.

Det Con Haider Ali said: "The seriousness of this offence can be demonstrated by the fact that when police identified Riley's potential links to firearms, a warrant was executed at that address, and being aware of police arrival, an item was seen to be going over a fence from the garden where Riley was arrested.

"This transpired to be a loaded and viable firearm.

"Since then, Riley has been further forensically linked to two more weapons from the storage container which has put him in possession of a significant number of weapons that we have now been able to remove from circulation."

Riley had been convicted of four counts of possession of a prohibited firearms weapon, two counts of possession of a firearm when prohibited, one offence of possessing ammunition without a firearms certificate and one count of possessing ammunition when prohibited.