Portsmouth man 'fixated' with accessing Buckingham Palace grounds spared jail after admitting trespass

Daniel Brydges, of Laburnum Grove, North End, scaled two fences to gain access to the Palace gardens on December 18 last year. He was also found ‘stooped’ behind a Land Rover near The Royal Mews gate four days later, Westminster Magistrates’ Court heard.

Prosecutor Sudara Weerasena said the 33-year-old had previously been stopped under the Terrorism Act while trying to get into the Palace grounds on December 11 and twice on November 15 last year. ‘He appears to have been fixated on the Palace grounds,’ she said in court.

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Brydges previously pleaded guilty to two counts of trespassing on a protected site and criminal damage. He previously broke a barbed wire fence during the first incident.

As previously reported in The News, Ms Weerasena said security officers spotted Brydges on CCTV, and police officers tracked him down and arrested him on December 18,

During a police interview, Brydges told officers he was homeless and looking for somewhere to sleep, she said. Brydges was bailed on December 19 on the condition he did not try and enter any royal residences. However, Ms Weerasena said, on December 22, at 1.06pm, Brydges scaled The Royal Mews fence and hide behind a Land Rover, before being found by a security officer.

‘At this point he climbs back over the fence and tries to run away,’ she said. Ms Weerasena added that Brydges was chased by the security officer, and later ‘claimed he had gone in there to collect a bottle of water which he had dropped’.

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District judge Annabel Pilling sentenced Brydges to 12 weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for 18 months, and said he must not go within 100m of a royal residence. The sentence includes mental health treatment and rehabilitation requirements, while Brydges, who is claiming benefits, must pay £748 in costs and other charges.

‘It is worrying that it is still not clear what your motivation was,’ the judge told him. ‘This was a very serious security breach.

‘There was a suggestion you were fixated somehow by the Palace or by members of the royal family. You were persistent and determined.’ The late Queen was at Windsor Castle on both occasions when the trespassing took place.