Albanian in bomb hoax jailed for 15 months

An Albanian asylum-seeker who sparked a bomb scare at a Yorkshire tax office has been jailed for 15 months.

About 70 staff at the Inland Revenue's accounts office in Victoria Street, Shipley, had to be moved from the building in January 2004 after what appeared to be an incendiary device was discovered inside an envelope – which had the name Mr A Hoxha written on it.

Bradford Crown Court heard yesterday that Londoner Armand Myrto, now 26, had attached electronic circuit boards to a friend's tax reminder form and posted it back to the revenue office with the word "surprise" written on the back.

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Prosecutor Stephen Wood said obscenities had also been written on the envelope as well as the friend's real name, Mr A Hoxha.

Although police quickly established the device was not in fact a bomb, staff at the tax office were said to have been shaken up by the experience.

Scientific analysis of the gummed part of the envelope helped police to obtain a DNA profile from Myrto's saliva but he was not traced until early 2008 when he was arrested for other offences and the police got a "hit" on their database.

After hand-writing analysis also pointed towards Myrto he finally admitted despatching an article causing a bomb hoax.

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Although Myrto, of Great Dover Street, London, maintained he had no recollection of sending the device through the post Mr Wood said the obvious intention was to make it appear it was some kind of incendiary device.

Myrto's friend was also arrested as part of the police inquiry but the court heard he co-operated with the police and was exonerated.

Recorder Richard Mansell QC noted that Myrto was now an "overstayer" in this country having arrived in 2000 and was at risk of being deported by the immigration authorities.

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