A Chessington teenager who caused more than £1,000 of damage, after setting fire to seats on a train travelling between Tolworth and Chessington, has been handed a 12-week suspended prison sentence by Kingston magistrates.

Robert Richards, 18, of Pear Tree Close, boarded the train at Tolworth on Monday, November 23, last year with two 16-year-old boys, who cannot be named for legal reasons.

The group moved from carriage to carriage collecting newspapers before piling them on to two seats and setting them alight. They then moved to a different carriage and got off at Chessington South.

The train guard used an on board fire extinguisher to put out the blaze, which destroyed two seats that cost South West Trains £1,163.28 to replace.

Richards, who appeared at Kingston Magistrates’ Court on Friday, April 30, was identified using CCTV images. Magistrates also ordered him to do 200 hours of unpaid community work and pay £400 compensation and £50 costs.

One of the boys, from New Malden, was given a 12-month referral order earlier in the month. The other, from Chessington, was told to be present at an attendance centre on Saturdays for a total of 36 hours.

Detective Constable Terry Millward said: “This group’s behaviour was reckless and completely unacceptable. Unnecessary vandalism of this sort costs thousands of pounds in repairs but aside from the financial implications trains are taken out of service, affecting passengers.”