Westgate Centre: Schoolboy punched by robbers as bag tossed

Maidenhead men Kai Watts and Oliver McGregor, both now 24, were in Oxford for a night out on December 11, 2021, when they targeted the city schoolboy.

McGregor tore the teenager’s rucksack from his back and rifled through it while Watts felled the boy with a single punch.

Jailing each man for 28 months at Oxford Crown Court on Friday (July 21), Recorder Joseph Hart said: “The two of you were in town for what should have been a pleasant night out with your friends when the two of you for whatever reason decided to attack a schoolboy and rob him of his rucksack.”

The victim, who the defendants suggested had offered them drugs, was left bleeding so badly from a wound to his head that his trousers were stained with blood. The gash was stapled at hospital.

Following the robbery, the pair re-joined their friends at a cocktail bar on the roof of the Westgate Centre. McGregor, who had tossed the stolen rucksack over the top floor balcony, could be seen on bar CCTV seemingly acting out what had just happened.

The robbery took place outside John Lewis in Oxford's Westgate Centre Picture: Richard Cave (Image: JLP)

Sentencing, Recorder Hart said: “This was a joint attack on a 16 year old man, which involved some violence and he was brought to the ground and robbed of his bag.

“The two of you stopped the victim’s friends trying to recover the rucksack from you as you made off.”

He noted that the two men returned to the cocktail bar and rejoined their friends. “What is clear from that close circuit television is that you, Mr McGregor, can be seen demonstrating blows in the air.

“Both defendants appear to shake each other’s hands a move in for a hug or fraternal kiss in a gesture that can only be interpreted as self-congratulatory.”

Watts, of Fane Way, Maidenhead, who appeared in court via video link from HMP Bullingdon, was sentenced to 28 months.

A letter to the judge from his mother said she had seen in an ‘enormous change’ in her son since he had been sent to prison recently for burglary.

The defendant himself had written what defence advocate Rob Slinn described as a ‘candid’ letter, expressing his deep regret and shame at what happened. On his release, he hoped to ‘put this episode of his life behind him’.

McGregor was caught on CCTV in the cocktail bar afterwards seemingly bragging about what had happened Picture: CPS (Image: Crown Prosecution Service)

Co-defendant McGregor, of Boyn Road, Maidenhead, received 28 months. At the time he committed the robbery he had just got out of university, had ‘found himself at a loose end’ and was of previous good character, his brief Christopher Pembridge said.

A year after, however, he was convicted of what the judge summarised as ‘drunken violence in the street’. Mr Pembridge urged the Recorder to take an ‘exceptional course’ and suspend the prison sentence.

Both men entered bases of plea saying they did not know the victim’s age, that the boy had approached them ‘offering something’ and ‘pestering’ them, and denying kicking the youngster.

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