Revealed: The deadly arsenal of gun fanatic jailed for 16 years who recreated Private Ryan in his loft







It is a fearsome array of weapons including a Kalashnikov, Uzi sub-machine gun, shotguns and pistols.

But this astonishing arsenal was not seized from a gang of organised criminals, but the private collection of a fruit and veg trader.

David Evans had claimed he only bought replica weapons to use for ‘war games’ in his loft, where he kitted out mannequins with imitation guns to recreate scenes from war movies such as Saving Private Ryan.

Grocery trader David Evans's arsenal including an Uzi, an MP40 machine gun, silenced pistols and even American and Israeli weaponry that was only issued to special forces

Dc Steve Goddard with the recovered guns. Police feared they could have fallen into the hands of far-Right extremists, terrorists or drugs gangs



But yesterday the self-confessed gun ‘fanatic’ was starting a 16-year jail term after being convicted of a total of 29 charges of possessing and transferring the weapons to two brothers who are already behind bars.

Gun fanatic: David Evans, pictured, had Uzis, shotguns and a hitman-style pistol with a silencer, some of which were only issued to foreign armies

Evans’s haul, which at one point was stored in a cardboard box kept on top of an industrial-sized fridge at his business premises, included American and Israeli military-issue machine guns – some so state-of-the-art that they are issued only to special forces.

A ‘hitman-style’ pistol with a silencer attached was also discovered, along with more than 500 bullets.

Evans, 42, from Wordsley, near Stourbridge, West Midlands, also held an MP40 machine gun.

Officers who seized the cache of 16 deadly guns initially feared they may have been stored on behalf of a far-Right group such as the English Defence League.

They said the guns could have caused mayhem had they fallen into the hands of terrorists or the region’s drugs gangs.



But investigations revealed Evans was a collector who bought many of the weapons on eBay and had no intention to use them for crime.

He told police: ‘I just love guns… I am a bloody fanatic with them.’

Judge Michael Challinor said the machine guns were known as ‘room sprayers, designed for one purpose – killing people’.



He told Evans: ‘You cynically and deliberately collected this cache of weapons, some of which were described as dangerous a weapon as one firearms expert had seen in his 37-year career.’

Evans had been banned from owning guns after he was jailed for three years in 2005 for posting an illegal firearm to a legitimate dealer in Scotland.

He told officers: ‘It might sound a bit sad but in my loft I had some mannequins which I dressed as German soldiers, American soldiers – but obviously I had no guns.

Police officers at the farm where Evans ran his business from



‘That’s when I started buying the guns to put on the uniforms.’

Wolverhampton Crown Court heard that in late 2009, as his marriage crumbled and his business ran into difficulties, Evans asked friend Daniel Thatcher, a 25-year-old mechanic, to store the weapons.

Thatcher, who lived with his parents, passed five of the weapons to his brother, Lee, 29.

The weapons haul came to light when police arrested Daniel Thatcher on an unrelated matter and found a 9mm Uzi and a 9mm pistol and cartridges under his bed.

Detective Inspector Gary Dring said: ‘If word had got out that there were unsecured guns... they may have been stolen by criminals and I dread to think what could have happened.’