Teenager who threw lighted arrows and bricks at police guarding hotel jailed

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.”

I can't imagine that he's politically astute. He just went along with the mob

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.