A 19-year-old man who threw bricks and lighted arrows at police protecting a hotel told detectives he went there to “sort out” the asylum seekers living inside, a court has heard.
Father-of-one Drew Jarvis was jailed for three years at Sheffield Crown Court on Tuesday by a judge who told him: “Your conduct was shameful and it was disgraceful.
“You exhibited a high level of violence in the context of what was going on.”
Jarvis was filmed lighting an arrow and throwing it at officers during the rioting outside the Holiday Inn Express in Manvers, Rotherham, on Sunday August 4, the judge heard.
Other footage was shown in court, filmed from inside the hotel, of Jarvis throwing wooden planks at the building, wearing a hoodie and a mask.
When the Recorder of Sheffield, Judge Jeremy Richardson KC, asked “what possessed him to turn up”, Dale Harris, defending, said: “Probably stupidity.”
The court heard how Jarvis told police after his arrest that he went to the hotel because it was “just another opportunity to vote, to sort out the hotel, to sort out the people staying within it”.
He told police that “they would be better off in their own country”.
But Judge Richardson said: “I can’t imagine that he’s politically astute. He just went along with the mob.”
Judge Richardson said Jarvis was part of a “mob of ignorant and violent individuals” which ripped down a fence behind the hotel and threw planks at the building.
The footage played in court, filmed from an upper storey, showed scores of rioters throwing missiles as a loud, recorded fire alarm message urged residents to leave the building.
The judge said: “It was doubtless a terrifying incident.”
Mr Harris told the court his client left school at 16 with no qualifications and has never worked, but has no previous convictions.
He has an eight-month-old daughter.
The court heard that, when he was first arrested, he told police he was drunk at the hotel and “I got in with the wrong crowd. I don’t know why I did it.”
Unemployed Jarvis, of no fixed address, but originally from Barnsley, admitted violent disorder last week.
Also on Tuesday, Judge Richardson jailed self-employed construction worker Kaine Hicks, 22, for two years and eight months after he admitted hurling abuse at police protecting the hotel and pushing against officers’ shields.
The judge said Hicks was “exceptionally aggressive” towards the officers.
After watching body-worn camera footage of the incident, Judge Richardson told Hicks, of Wombwell Road, Barnsley: “You were part of a mob of ignorant and violent individuals.”
He said Hicks was “pushing and shoving towards the front of the group, hurling abuse at the police officers and behaving in a comprehensively aggressive manner”.
The court heard how one officer reported how he had never before experienced such violence and disorder and had been left shocked by the level of hatred aimed at him and his colleagues.
Mr Harris, defending, said his client was ashamed by his conduct as he does not hold far-right views and “does not regard himself as having any racist opinions”.
Two further defendants appeared at Sheffield Crown Court on Tuesday in relation to the disorder at the Rotherham hotel but will now be sentenced on Wednesday after the court ran out of time.
Elliott Wragg, 23, and Stuart Bolton, 38, have both admitted violent disorder in relation to the events on August 4.
Judge Richardson was shown video footage of both defendants during the disorder at the hotel.
This featured Bolton hurling abuse at police, including racist slurs at an Asian officer.
The court heard how Bolton, of Manchester Square, New Holland, had driven with his partner and one of his children from his home in North Lincolnshire when he found out about the protest ongoing outside the hotel housing asylum seekers.
Wragg, of Assembly Way, Barnsley, was filmed throwing items including wood at the police and was captured in a group outside the hotel at the point others had broken into the building through a fire door and were stealing fire extinguishers to use against officers.
Both men will be sentenced by Judge Richardson at Sheffield Crown Court at 10am on Wednesday.
