Thieves caught red handed as they tunnelled into a jewellers in London have been jailed after they pocketed more than £700,000 in burglaries as part of an organized crime group.
Officers from the Met’s Flying Squad brought the three criminals to justice after two were busted near a tunnel in south London.
They had knocked through a wall in a house to allow them to wriggle into the jewellers in Tooting and plunder watches and jewellery.
But police were scrambled to the scene at just after 3am on July 17 after reports of a burglary where they found the tunnel and launched a hunt for the suspects.
Dramatic bodyworn footage shows officers swooping on two of the thieves while a third was later detained at Stansted airport trying to flee the country.
The officers found tools the trio had used to break through the wall of a massage parlour which is next door to the jewellers.
The footage shows one burglar ordered to stop as a taser is trained on him in an alley while another is spotted on a roof and is ordered to clamber down and is handcuffed.
Ioan Asaefti, 39, Laurentiu-Daniel Nitisoara, 38, and Sergiu Plastin, 42, were all sentenced at Kingston Crown Court on Friday.
They had previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit burglary with intent to steal and cause criminal damage at the same court. Asafeti was jailed for four years, Plastin three years and Nitisoara two years.
The case showed the burglars had been part of an organized crime group looting homes and businesses for months. The detectives also believe the burglaries could have extended to Europe.
The Met’s Flying Squad, which specialises in busting robbers, found the three had been on a crime spree between May and July.
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The court heard that they would burgle properties overnight, bypassing security measures and tunnelling into premises to steal valuables.
Following the arrests of Asafeti and Nitisoara, Flying Squad detectives identified a car linked to the group and used mobile phone data to track down Plastin. They arrested Plastin at Stansted Airport as he tried to flee to Ireland.
Detectives gathered extensive CCTV footage showing members of the group obtaining tools and other equipment used in the offenses.
Detective Superintendent Dan Mitchell, of the Met’s Flying Squad, said: ‘These criminals dug their own hole after emergency response officers caught them red-handed.
‘Their arrests didn’t just stop this burglary. They formed part of a wider Flying Squad investigation that uncovered an organized crime group linked to a string of jewellery shop break-ins across London worth more than £700,000.
‘We’re driving down commercial burglary across the capital, with offenses falling by 12 per cent in the past year. Our message to these criminals is clear: target London businesses and we’ll hunt you down and put you before the courts.’
A Met police statement said: ‘The Met remains committed to tackling burglary across the capital and keeping Londoners safe. Commercial burglary offenses fell by 12.1 per cent in the 12 months ending July, compared with the previous 12 months.
‘The Met has also put hundreds more officers on the frontlines of community crime-fighting teams, upping visible patrols in the right ‘hot spots’ so they can catch criminals.’