Suspended sentence for ex-SAS sergeant Nightingale

Nightingale, a former senior NCO with the elite special forces unit, was given two years military detention suspended for 12 months after a 9mm Glock pistol and 338 bullets were found in the bedroom of his house in Hereford.

The 38-year-old father-of-two, from Crewe, Cheshire, originally pleaded guilty to the two charges last year and was jailed for 18 months by a military court.

But he had his sentence cut and then quashed by the court of appeal after a public outcry. He denied the charges at a second court martial at Bulford in Wiltshire, but was found guilty earlier this month.

Nightingale wore his SAS uniform to receive his sentence on Thursday. Judge advocate Jeff Blackett told the soldier his explanation of how the gun came to be in his room “lacked credibility”.

Spared jail due to ‘exceptional character’

But he said there were “exceptional circumstances” that allowed the court to suspend the sentence “because of your exceptional character”.

The judge added: “We understand how difficult these proceedings have been for you and your family. However, you have brought much of that anguish upon yourself and your public assertions that you are scapegoat or the victim of some wider political agenda is absolute nonsense.

Your public assertions that you are scapegoat or the victim of some wider political agenda is absolute nonsense. Judge Jeff Blackett

“You are simply someone against whom there was a strong prima facie case of serious wrongdoing and, given the dangers to society caused by illegal firearms and their misuse, it was in the public interest to prosecute you.

“You have now had a fair trial before a civilian judge and an independent and impartial board.

“It would have made no difference had you been tried before a civilian jury – the evidence against you was overwhelming and I have no doubt the verdicts would have been the same.”

Defence that ‘lacked credibility’

The court heard how the gun and bullets were brought back from Iraq and were found by civilian police in September 2011 in the rented house Nightingale shared with another SAS soldier, identified in court only as soldier N.

Police were acting on a tip-off from soldier N’s estranged wife who said there might be a gun at the three-bedroom house.

The pistol was found in Nightingale’s wardrobe and the ammunition was under his bed in a plastic box.

Nightingale, who was serving in Afghanistan at the time of the discovery, said he had no knowledge of them being in his bedroom and said someone else must have put them there. He claimed a head injury received during an endurance marathon in Brazil in 2009 had affected his memory.

Military detention

His lawyers suggested soldier N – Sgt Nightingale’s former best friend – had brought the Glock pistol to the UK from Iraq.

Soldier N was given two years’ military detention last year after admitting possessing another Glock pistol, which he brought back from Iraq in 2003, and ammunition.

Thursday’s hearing was told that Nightingale and his family, who were in court to hear the sentence, have spent around £120,000 trying to clear his name.

Nightingale, who served in the former Yugoslavia, Northern Ireland, Iraq and Afghanistan in an 18-year career, has received a medical discharge and will leave the army on 14 February next year.

Possession of a prohibited firearm normally carries a five-year minimum term of imprisonment, unless there are “exceptional circumstances”.