Will depraved Holly Willoughby kidnap plotter Gavin Plumb ever be released?

Holly Willoughby kidnap plotter Gavin Plumb was told he would only be released from jail if experts deemed him to no longer present a threat to women.

Branding Plumb a danger to women at large, Judge Mr Justice Edward Murray sentenced him today to three concurrent life sentences for conspiring to kidnap, rape and murder the national treasure, with a minimum term of 16 years for each.

He will now serve a minimum term of 15 years and 85 days in jail due to time spent on remand.

However, Judge Murray warned him that was a "minimum term" and it mean that was the earliest he could be considered for parole.

If the Parole Board still believes he presents a danger to the public after serving the minimum term, Plumb will remain behind bars.

The 37-year-old former security guard appeared at Chelmsford Crown Court today, July 12 2024, to be sentenced after being found guilty by the jury last week.

Plumb was also placed under a restraining order preventing him from contacting the star or attending any TV show she may be involved in, in the event he is ever let out.

The judge said a sexual harm prevention order, which places strict limitations on sexuial offenderrs, such as access to phones and internet, would not be necessary as he will remain on a lifelong licence with similar restrictions should he ever be released.

Sentencing Plumb, Judge Mr Justice Edward Murray said some of the messages he unwittingly exchanged with an undercover US police officer and other abduction chat room members, were so extreme and graphic, that they had not been read out in open court.

He said: "I have no doubt this was considerably more than a fantasy to you and you had been planning it for more than two years.

"The plan was unrealistic for a number of reasons including your poor physical health but you clearly thought it was feasible.

"You talked about doing it alone, but you always intended to if you could find the right man or men or the right "crew" to help you to do it."

The judge said that he had even told the US undercover police officer that he had someone to practice on, a female neighbour, who he sent a photograph to him of and also that his son, 15, was interested in taking part.

Although police found no evidence his son was involved or even knew about the plot.

Prosecuting, Alison Morgan KC, had earlier pushed for him to receive a life sentence, saying Plumb posed a "clear and significant risk of serious harm to members of the public" through further offending.

She told the court: "This was a conspiracy of abduction of the victim with intent to murder. The offence was motivated by or involved sexual or sadistic conduct.

"There have been life-changing consequences to the victim’s ability to carry on with their normal private and professional life.

"It is clear that the intended offences are of the highest level of seriousness."

Plumb, from Harlow, Essex, had denied soliciting murder, inciting kidnap and inciting rape of Ms Willoughby.

Plumb was accused of developing an obsession with the mother-of-three and encouraging others online to carry out his alleged plans alongside him to live out his "ultimate fantasy".

Plumb was accused of conspiring online with a man he knew as David Nelson who turned out to be the undercover officer from Minnesota, in the United States.

Prosecutor Alison Morgan KC told the jury during her closing speech Plumb went to “great lengths to suggest to other people it was not fantasy" under the online username "Big Bear". The court heard Plumb told a man, named Marc, that "fantasy isn't enough any more" and "I want the real thing".

Ms Morgan previously showed the jury a photograph of an alleged "abduction kit" which was assembled by the defendant and shared with Mr Nelson. The "kit" included metal cable ties and handcuffs.

The barrister also said there was a "nasty reality" to Plumb and he "shocked even those who were prepared to fantasise with him" - adding that he was "intent on making this happen".

"He told Marc again and again he was going to attempt this at some point, with or without others," Ms Morgan told the court.

Plumb's plot allegedly involved attempting to "ambush" Ms Willoughby at her family home and he was accused of discussing taking annual leave from his job to work on the plan.

Plumb's barrister Sasha Wass KC said he had "fallen down a rabbit hole" of fantastical online chat rooms where "lonely, disaffected people were feeding off their fantasies".

She told the court: "It was the fantasy of rape and abduction that gave him the gratification."

Ms Wass also stated: "He had neither the means nor the opportunity to carry out any of the things he mentioned in his chats."

She told the jury Plumb's messages were "vile and misogynistic" and said "Plumb himself accepts they're dark".

Ms Wass said during her closing speech he "will never meet and had no intention of meeting" Ms Willoughby.

She told the court Plumb has a "dark and twisted fantasy, but a fantasy nonetheless" ahead of the jury's deliberations.

Ms Willoughby said following the news, women "should not be made to feel unsafe going about our daily lives and in our own homes", as she thanked the undercover US police officer who helped foil Plumb's kidnap plot. She shared in a statement: "Thank you to the Crown Prosecution Service, the Rt Hon Mr Justice Murray, Alison Morgan KC, the members of the jury and all involved in this case for ensuring that justice was done and that the defendant will not be able to harm any more women.

"I would also like to commend the bravery of his previous victims for speaking up at the time. Without their bravery, this conviction may not have been possible," she added.

Ms Morgan said aggravating factors of Plumb's offences, included the nature, duration and sophistication of the planning of the offences, over two years, the purchase of items to carry out the plot, including chloroform, the kidnap kit and knife, the research he conducted into personal details of Ms Willoughby.

She added this was worsened by the sexual motivation of the offending and the extreme and gratuitous degradation of Ms Willoughby as part of the offending.

She said he had also sought to encourage more than one person to commit the offences and the planned offences were intended to be committed in her home and involve her family and children.

Plumb's previous convictions in 2006 and 2008 of trying to kidnap a total of four other women were also taken into account.

Defending Plumb, Sasha Wass KC, said Plumb accepted having a dark obsession with the star, but at the same time "worshipped her."

She said he had read the extensive victim impact statement from Ms Willoughby in full, and was: "devastated to be the cause of such pain to her.

"He remains embarrassed and ashamed of the online conversations that form the focus of this trail, conversations that he always expected would remain private."

She added: "All of the offences remained at the planning stage. He never left his house during any significant time and had never been to the area where Miss Willoughby lived. He was not able to drive, did not have access to a car and was completely incapable of scaling any of the perimeter walls of her house as he fantasied about doing during the course of his online chats.

"Even if he got to her house, there was no viable plan of how she would be kept at his address with the other people in adjoining flats... it is putting it highly to say it was a carefully planned operation... many features of the plan were so unworkable that the plan could not in fact have taken place. We say it was not a sophisticated plan."