Two men have been jailed for trafficking the gun used to shoot a seven-year-old boy and his mum - as the court heard the weapon was found hidden in a bag with three teddy bears.
Christian Hickey Jr and his mother Jane were shot in the legs at the doorstep of their Eccles home last October.
Aldair Warmington, 29, has been jailed for six years, and Christopher Hall, 46, jailed for five years, following the appalling attack.
The Heckler and Koch 9mm was being moved from one gang to another by Hall, under the direction of Warmington, when police seized it on the night of December 15 last year.
Hall had pulled up in a taxi just past the Frozen Mop pub in Mobberley when police swooped on the vehicle. He admitted he was transporting a consignment for somebody - claiming he thought the package was cannabis.
Instead, police found a green and yellow carrier bag containing three teddy bears and a plastic container wrapped in a bag and taped up. Inside the container, and further wrapped inside pink ‘dog pooh’ bags, were the Heckler and Koch with a magazine, and a Baikal, blank-firing replica pistol which had been converted to fire real 9mm bullets. Neither weapon was loaded and no ammunition was found.
A Manchester Crown Court sentencing hearing was told Warmington had visited courier Hall’s Little Hulton home, had told him where to go, and travelled to the area in a separate taxi.
Warmington, of no fixed address, was linked to the offence by phone traffic, and admitted possessing prohibited weapons and a lockknife he had in his pocket when police arrested him the follow day. Hall, of Little Hulton, admitted possessing prohibited firearms.
As well as being used in the attack on Hickeys, the Heckler and Koch was also used to shoot Jamie Rothwell, 28, at a car wash in Ashton-in-Makerfield in March last year.
The shootings are among a series linked to conflict between rival factions in Salford. There have been over two dozen shootings since May 2014 in the city, where it’s believed there are four separate disputes between armed gangs raging.
They include the killing of Paul Massey in July outside his home in Manchester Road, Clifton, Salford in July last year.
Violent feuding between members of a gang called the A Team which split into factions is said to be the root cause of the dispute which claimed the life of Mr Massey, and led to the attack on the Hickey family.
Before that the attack on the Hickeys, the Heckler and Koch was used in seven other shootings in Liverpool between 2011 and 2014, five of which resulted in people being wounded.
On top of this, prosecutor Gary Woodhall said experts had found ‘similarities’ between the Heckler and Koch and the gun used in two other shootings in Liverpool, including one in 2012 which resulted in a wounding.
Watch: Police raids and arrests in Salford following a spate of shootings
Meanwhile the Baikal was used twice in Liverpool in August 2014.
Nina Grahame, defending Warmington, who has convictions for dangerous driving and violent disorder, said the movement of the guns happened ‘under the direction of a third party who is not in the dock’.
She said Warmington’s partner was a quantity surveyor of ‘impeccable character’ who saw him as ‘caring father’ - adding that his family regarded his involvement in crime with ‘condemnation and horror’.
Christopher Hall has previous convictions for driving offences and drug possession.
Neither man has been implicated in any of the shootings. But the sentencing judge said they both must have known that the weapons were being moved from one organised crime group to another.
Sentencing the pair, Judge Richard Mansell QC told them: “You were involved in the transporting of two prohibited firearms from a lcoation in Manchester unknown to a location in Mobberley in Cheshire.
"I have no doubt the movement of those firearms was at the request or order of an organised criminal or criminal gang who required these firearms for use in some offence - you both played an integral part in ensuring these firearms stayed in circulation.”
