32 years' jail for gangster who ordered execution

A gang leader who arranged the execution in Peckham of a teenage boy from his prison cell was jailed for at least 32 years at the Old Bailey today.

Ola Apena, 23, used a smuggled mobile phone to order the killing in June last year of 17-year-old Samuel Ogunro after branding him a "snitch".

On the day he was due to stand trial with Apena on gun charges, the victim was found dead with a single shot to the head in a burnt-out car.

Lyrics referring to guns, snitches and murder were later found in Apena's cell along with a gang logo linked to the notorious Peckham Boys gang. The Peckham Boys and its associated offshoots have been linked to a decade of murders across the capital.

Apena, of no fixed abode, was convicted of conspiracy to murder after a two-month trial. Judge Richard Hawkins said: "Your culpability for the death is at least as high as those who killed him. The murder was intended to obstruct the course of justice."