Two teenagers from Manchester have been jailed over a series of violent robberies which saw victims lured to locations and attacked, the pair deliberately targeting people who were looking to buy a bike from Facebook Marketplace.
Detective Inspector Natalie McDonald from Greater Manchester Police called the string of offences “carefully planned attacks on innocent members of the public, that left their homes in the morning to go and buy a bike”.
“They trusted in good will and the actions that greeted them were truly appalling,” she explained.
Bilal Jama and Michael Ogbeide-John, both 18, were sentenced to three-and-a-half years and four years in prison respectively, police in Manchester linking them to a series of violent robberies between December 2024 and January 2025.
At the time of the attacks both were 17 years old, the pair presenting themselves as Facebook Marketplace users looking to sell a second-hand bike.
When their victims arrived with cash for the purchase they were attacked and robbed. Jama and Ogbeide-John pleaded guilty to three counts of robbery and one attempted robbery, Ogbeide-John also admitting a charge of possession of a bladed article.
The first victim was robbed of £130, money brought to Naburn Street in Manchester to purchase a grey mountain bike advertised on Facebook Marketplace by an account named ‘Angela Davies’. CCTV showed the robbers with their face covered, the victim chased and shoved to the ground when he arrived to buy the bike.
A few days later, on 30 December, a second victim was left unconscious in an alleyway after meeting the robbers to buy a £450 mountain bike. Police say the victim was “taken by surprise, assaulted and something sharp placed below his chin”.
The victim suffered seven fractures to his jaw and needed six metal plates and full reconstructive surgery to his face.
On 21 January a father and son went to meet a seller of a £550 bike. They agreed a deal online for £80 and a bike in exchange.
As the victim was getting the bike out of the car, Jama and Ogbeide-John walked past him, before carrying on walking and waiting on the corner. They then asked why the victim was there, at which point he became suspicious and lied in the hope of making an escape.
Ogbeide-John threatened to stab the father and told the son: “Give me the bike. I’m taking the bike nicely or nastily”. Ogbeide-John was arrested on 24 January after officers spotted a man walking past Longsight Police Station who they believed matched the description.
Jama was arrested two days later after evidence seized led officers to his identity. Last week, the pair were sentenced, Ogbeide-John getting four years and Jama three and a half.
“As a team, we worked relentlessly to find out what happened, we were working against the clock as we knew the pair would strike again if they were not stopped,” Detective Inspector McDonald commented.
“The crimes were carried out purely for greed, they lured the victims in and knowing they had money on them and then violently robbed them of their cash and we hope the sentence passed today can give some comfort for the victims to know that these two males have been jailed to think about their actions.”
15 thoughts on “Violent robbers jailed for series of “carefully planned attacks” targeting people buying bikes from Facebook Marketplace”
I suppose it can be classed
I suppose it can be classed as victim blaming, but it’s pretty simple: never, ever agree to meet to buy a bike unless it’s at a domestic address or a workplace. Not only are you risking being robbed like these people were but even if there is a bike and they sell it to you that will almost certainly be helping to perpetuate the stolen bike market. I often help friends to find bikes and frequently sellers will suggest meeting at a railway station or other landmark; if they refuse when I ask them if I can meet them at their home or their work I won’t go ahead, no matter how tempting the deal is.
The problem there is genuine
The problem there is genuine sellers are reluctant to give their home addresses out in case of being targeted by theives posing as buyers.
Advice I’ve heard is for somewhere public, busy, with good CCTV and as high a chance of intervention as possible (acknowledging a higher proportion of people than ever are crap these days and more likely to film you than call an ambo) if something goes completely sideways.
I reckon the House of Lords
I reckon the House of Lords would be good, seems to cover all those bases. Met a chap there a few years back who was offering some PPE, a snip at a hundred million or so…
ROOTminus1 wrote:
Yes, I can see that although conversely if you are a genuine seller more chance of the “buyer” grabbing the bike and riding off with it if you’re out in public than in your own home – I saw this happen in the summer in Brompton Cemetery. On a couple of occasions when something about a buyer hasn’t quite rung true I’ve made sure that a stalwart mate has been present when they’ve visited (both times, I’m pleased to say, they were genuine buyers). I guess probably the best protection is not to sell on Facebook marketplace or Gumtree and stick to eBay (now free for sellers) where you can check out a potential buyer’s bona fides before arranging a meeting.
Brompton Cemetery, where fold
Brompton Cemetery, where fold-ups haunt this mortal realm.
You can fit more in there
You can fit more in there though … and do so quickly!
(Weren’t some London churches known in previous centuries for prioritising the cash they got from stuffing extraordinary numbers of ex-parishioners into the crypt – even over the needs of living parishioners who started deserting because of the smell?)
chrisonabike wrote:
Yes indeed, that was why Brompton and the other six “magnificent seven” London cemeteries were built.
Is that a folding cemetery?
Is that a folding cemetery?
A Brompton (or should it be a
A Brompton (or should it be a Brookwood?) is the obvious choice for multi-modal funerals – especially starting from London…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Necropolis_Railway
There’s a bit of a trend in
There’s a bit of a trend in the States for arranging these meet-ups for the parking lot of the local police station; in some cases the police themselves encourage this.
JWDT wrote:
That’s a great idea, but I can pretty much guarantee if I tried that down Brixton nick it would be two minutes tops before some jobsworth bizzy threatened me with arrest for a made-up public order offence if I didn’t move on.
If you don’t wish to support
If you don’t wish to support USA tech oligarchy there’s still no reason to trade with cash since the UK Faster Payment System makes an interbank transfer almost instant. Having inspected the product the content customer just transfers the agreed amount, which the seller sees cleared in their account, without delay. Shared, in person, sort code and account number enables this as that only allows payment in.
Yeah, I’ve got a good Fuji
Yeah, I’ve got a good Fuji gravel bike to sell but its been sitting in my kitchen for over a year now unadvertised as I cant be bothered with all the cr@p, especially the thought of giving out my home address!
As a buyer, I recently went
As a buyer, I recently went to the vendors street, parked up and got out of the car, the vendor could then suss me out from his house and having satisfied himself that I was OK, he then came out with the bike.
I sat on a bike sale for ages
I sat on a bike sale for ages because I’d heard scare stories about scams and robberies, but have finally sold two on ebay for local collection this year. Very straightforward, payment managed by ebay rather than cash on collection, and ebay provides a collection code – I won’t hand over the bike without it, and say so in the listing!
Appreciate that may be easier said than done if someone threatens you though, and I did just hand over a lower value item recently because it felt churlish to insist they go home and get the code. And admittedly I didn’t invite the buyers to my door either, just gave the street address like Natrix has said.