Dartford’s postbox painting vandal sentenced

A Dartford man who spray painted 38 postboxes has been sentenced to 100 hours of community service and ordered to pay compensation.

Danny Whiskin, 33, of Chaucer Way, Dartford had been charged with criminal damage after the postboxes in the Kent town were damaged with spray paint between 31 January and 9 March.

He pleaded guilty to all counts at Medway Magistrates Court on Friday.

The court heard Whiskin only had contact with his five children by letter.

Gold painted postboxes began appearing in Dartford in February.

Whiskin was initially arrested on 13 February and was bailed before being rearrested on 9 March following another spray painting incident.

In defending Mr Whiskin, Helgaardt Strydom said her client was in a “sad situation” where he had “five children but he only gets to see them by mail, that’s the arrangement. It means life is not a rosy one, it’s a fairly bleak one.”

The court heard that Kent Police found 29 spray cans at his home, including 11 cans of gold paint, as well as receipts for £169 worth of spray paint.

Prosecutor Sidumiso Moyo, told the court that after Whiskin was first arrested in February no more gold post boxes appeared but that “other designs were reported including a Creme Egg and a Mr Blobby design.”

Whiskin was seen spray painting a postbox with a Union flag design on 9 March by a member of the public, and filmed painting another postbox in Osbourne Road in April.

Alongside community service, Whiskin must pay Royal Mail £2600 in compensation.

Royal Mail said it would cost £150 to refurbish each post box and in a business impact statement said: “This incident has caused Royal Mail to spend a significant amount of time investigating this matter.

“It will also cost a significant amount of money to rectify the colour of the post boxes to their iconic red.”

The company added that painting the postboxes could “potentially cause damage to parcels and letters inside” which “further damages our reputation”.