A teenage trio of robbers have been sentenced to a total of 11 years behind bars for a "thoroughly terrifying" raid on a Billericay travel agent.

Leon Prempeh, now 20, and his accomplices Andre Osborne, 18, and Etienne Lindsey, 19, grabbed cash and travellers cheques worth £18,000 during the robbery at Going Places in the High Street on August 10 last year.

They then tried to flee back to London but were foiled when a red security device burst covering the money and cheques in red dye.

A trial at Basildon Crown Court heard the men were tracked by a police helicopter and stopped in Romford town centre.

Osborne and Lindsey, both of Hackney, admitted robbery. Prempeh, also of Hackney, insisted he had never been to Billericay but was found guilty of robbery.

He had boasted to officers: "You ain't got nothing on me - nothing at all." Christine Agnew, prosecuting, said Prempeh and Lindsey both had a previous conviction for robbery. Prempeh also had a conviction for robbery with an offensive weapon.

Iain Daniels and Francis Gilbert, mitigating for Osborne and Lindsey, asked the court to take into account the men's youth and their guilty pleas.

Mr Daniels added the robbery was "a step up in crime" for Osborne who was only 17 at the time and had never been involved in anything so serious.

Judge Lockhart sentenced Prempeh to four and a half years with instructions he was not to be given parole for a least three years.

Osborne and Lindsey were sentenced to three and three and half years respectively in a young offenders institution.

In sentencing, he said: "I have seen the video of what happened and it shows that no weapon and no violence was used. It did not need to be.

"The manner in which the three of you acted and the way you were dressed was a thoroughly terrifying experience for the two women involved."

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