{"id":929561,"date":"2026-05-01T00:05:28","date_gmt":"2026-05-01T00:05:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/929561\/"},"modified":"2026-05-01T00:05:28","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T00:05:28","slug":"birmingham-man-jailed-over-three-hour-bulldozer-rampage-through-wolverhampton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/929561\/","title":{"rendered":"Birmingham man jailed over three-hour bulldozer rampage through Wolverhampton"},"content":{"rendered":"

Darren Coffey was on his way to ‘settle a dispute’ in the stolen Caterpillar D6<\/p>\n

16:49, 30 Apr 2026Updated 17:19, 30 Apr 2026<\/p>\n

‘Stolen’ bulldozer taken on rampage through Wolverhampton city centre (c) Charlene Harris<\/p>\n

A man who went on a three-hour rampage through Wolverhampton in a stolen 24-tonne bulldozer has been jailed.<\/p>\n

Darren Coffey stole the Caterpillar D6 in Staffordshire<\/a> on November 8 last year and damaged street signs and road surfaces as he drove it through city streets.<\/p>\n

The 41-year-old, who was in possession of two petrol cans, was making his way to Willenhall to ‘settle a dispute’.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Drug dealer left DNA on trigger of sawn-off shotgun<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Coffey, of Harborne<\/a> Park Road, Birmingham<\/a>, called into the control room and said he was going to burn down a property on New Road, Willenhall.<\/p>\n

West Midlands Police’s dogs and drone units were joined by response and traffic officers as they tried to stop Coffey.<\/p>\n

The National Police Air Service also provided an ‘eye in the sky’ and tracked the bulldozer from the air.<\/p>\n

\"Darren<\/p>\n

Darren Coffey’s movements were tracked by the ‘eye in the sky’<\/p>\n

A HGV was used to block the carriageway in Moseley<\/a> Village, Wolverhampton, but Coffey hit the lorry and forced his way through the ‘static road block’ and onto the wrong side of the carriageway.<\/p>\n

Coffey also reversed the machine at speed towards numerous police cars, but officers managed to move out of the way.<\/p>\n

Nearly three hours after police were first alerted to the incident, Coffey was arrested as he brought the machine to a stop at 8.15pm.<\/p>\n

‘Stolen’ bulldozer taken on rampage through Wolverhampton city centre (c) Charlene Harris<\/p>\n

He pleaded guilty to driving a motor vehicle dangerously, failing to stop, no insurance, no license and threat to damage or destroy property during an appearance at Wolverhampton Crown Court on April 29.<\/p>\n

Additionally, Coffey admitted two counts of criminal damage, drink driving, and aggravated vehicle taking and vehicle damage under \u00a35,000.<\/p>\n

Coffey was jailed for 18 months and banned from driving for three years and nine months.<\/p>\n

\"Darren<\/p>\n

Darren Coffey stole a bulldozer and drove it through the streets of Wolverhampton<\/p>\n

Following the sentencing, PC Rodgers, of West Midlands Police<\/a>, said: \u201cCoffey\u2019s actions back in November put innocent members of the public at risk of serious harm and caused a large amount of damage to street furniture and roads.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis incident saw teams from across the force work together alongside our colleagues from NPAS to try to bring Coffey\u2019s dangerous actions to a stop.<\/p>\n

\u201cThankfully after three hours the incident came to an end, and officers took him into custody.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut this whole incident placed a lot of people at risk, so I hope that this sentence and time in prison will give him some time to think about the sheer devastation that could have happened due to his actions on that night.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Darren Coffey was on his way to ‘settle a dispute’ in the stolen Caterpillar D6 16:49, 30 Apr…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":929562,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[7820],"tags":[855,748,30,188,393,4884,16,15,7830,4349],"class_list":["post-929561","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-birmingham","tag-birmingham","tag-britain","tag-courts","tag-crime","tag-england","tag-great-britain","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-west-midlands-police","tag-wolverhampton"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116496402259266054","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/929561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=929561"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/929561\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/929562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=929561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=929561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=929561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}