Romford armed robber who raided three hotels is jailed

Dymtro Shcherbinskyy, 42, of Blossom Closem Romford, played the leading role in a series of robberies which saw hotel employees tied up and threatened with guns. 

Shcherbinskyy and French national Ghislain Kiamuangana first raided a hotel in Southwark Bridge Road, Southwark, on January 3 last year – entering the hotel with their faces covered in the early hours of the morning. 

They then forced the employees to provide the combination for the safe and stole £4,000. 

CCTV image of one hotel robbery (Image: Metropolitan Police)Six days later they hit a hotel in Canning Town, again entering and pointing a gun at a staff member. 

The employee managed to escape before being chased down by Shcherbinskyy. 

The pair left empty handed as the staff member was unable to gain access to the safe. 

Then on January 14 the pair targeted a hotel in the City of London. 

An employee was held at gunpoint as they stole £3,000. 

An investigation found that the same white Sprinter van had been used in each robbery – and that the van had been stolen while it was being filled up with petrol at a petrol station in Lakeside in December 2021. 

Officers managed to identify Shcherbinskyy and carried out a street trawl around Romford due to intelligence that he was living there. 

Recovered firearm (Image: Metropolitan Police)They found the van outside an address in Blossom Close and carried out surveillance on Shcherbinskyy for nine days. 

Eventually they observed a meeting between Shcherbinskyy and Kiamuangana at a block of flats in Greenwich and they were arrested. 

A CO2 powered firearm and relevant clothing were seized from Kiamuangana’s address. 

Live rounds of ammunition, the stolen van and numerous sets of number plates were found at Shcherbinskyy’s address. 

Shcherbinskyy and Kiamuangana were convicted of two counts of robbery, one count of attempted robbery and three counts of possessing a firearm. 

Shcherbinskyy, who was identified as playing the leading role, was sentenced to 12 years’ in prison. 

French national Ghislain Kiamuangana, 34, of no fixed address, was sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment in total. 

This included a sentence for theft, after stealing £12,000 from a safe, while working at a hotel in 2021. 

Dymtro Shcherbinskyy, 42, and Ghislain Kiamuangana, 34 (Image: Metropolitan Police)Detective Inspector Colin Bishop, of the Major Crime Team at City of London Police, said: “This was a very serious case of armed robbery in the City and a terrifying ordeal for the victims, who were threatened with violence, and we were determined to do everything in our power to bring the perpetrators to justice. 

“We worked closely with our colleagues from the Flying Squad to secure this conviction and put these offenders behind bars. 

“A vital part of our investigation was obtaining CCTV evidence of the offenders fleeing the scene in a van with cloned plates.  

“This revealed that the crime was linked to previous robberies investigated by the Metropolitan Police Service and ultimately led to their successful arrest.”