A gang who stole a fleet of expensive, high-performance cars from some of London’s wealthiest residents were caught out after posting pictures on Facebook, including one showing a member eating a ‘cash’ sandwich.
The eight men stole nine cars - including BMWs, Range Rovers, Porsches and a £100,000 Mercedes - as well as jewellery, phones and laptops in 15 separate burglaries.
Detectives finally caught up with the them after one of the gang members posted a picture of himself sat on the bonnet of a stolen black Range Rover on Facebook.
That picture led police to discover a number of other incriminating images on the social network site and on the phones of the group, which showed them boasting about their wealth.
They showed the men sitting in the stolen cars, drinking champagne, wearing Rolex and Cartier watches and posing with huge piles of £20 and £50 notes.
In one of the pictures Conor Murphy, 19, is seen about to take a bite into a hundreds of pounds worth of notes sandwiched between two slices of bread.
Police also found video footage on their phones that showed them racing the cars they’d stolen and bragging about what other motors they had their eye on. Blackberry messages used by the gang to arrange burglaries were also discovered.
Seven of the men pleaded guilty to the burglaries earlier this year. Another man, Rory Mason, 18, denied any involvement in the plot to steal the cars but was found guilty by a jury last month.
Isleworth Crown Court heard how the men focused their attention on houses where valuable cars were kept.
Between April and September last year they broke into homes in Notting Hill, Kensington and Kensal Green and stole nine cars, as well as electrical goods and jewellery.
Mark Paltenghi, prosecuting, said: 'It seems quite plain from looking at the evidence that the principal, but not sole aim, was to target houses where valuable cars were kept. Car keys were stolen from the houses and the cars were driven away.'
Kalan Williams, 20, described as the ‘principal conspirator’, pleaded guilty to 11 of the burglaries. Footage from a police helicopter showing Williams running away from officers and dropping the key to a stolen Land Rover Discovery was used in court.
During their investigation, detectives found a picture taken from Williams’ phone which showed him holding three sets of keys to three vehicles. Two - a BMW and an Audi - were confirmed as having been stolen, while the other was an unknown car.
Another photograph found on Williams’ phone shows him sitting on a Porsche 911, which police later discovered was stolen from a house in Stamford Brook on July 26.
A BMW was stolen from the same house that night and police discovered video footage of Williams, Murphy, Niah George, 18, Akin Ford and Jonathan Oriba, both 20, racing the cars around the streets of west London at high speeds. The men were seen passing a phone between cars as the filmed themselves.
he gang were responsible for stealing a haul of cars worth hundreds of thousands over the space of five months. These included a Porsche 911, Porsche Caymen, Mercedes AMG C63, Land Rover Discovery, two BMW 6 series, Range Rover Sport, Audi Q5 and a VW Golf.
The white Mercedes was believed to be the gang’s ‘trophy car’. Many of the photos seized by police showed the men posing beside the £100,000 high-performance motor.
Even when the car was recovered by police and returned to its owner, the brazen group, who had kept the key, tried again to steal it only to find it had been reprogrammed. Their attempts were caught on CCTV and the owner of the car was seen chasing the thieves away in his boxer shorts.
The men were arrested after a series of dawn raids as part of the intelligence-led Operation Decker. Mason, of north Kensington, denied one count of conspiracy to commit a dwelling house burglary but was found guilty after a week-long trial.
Kalan Williamson, from Chelsea, Conor Murphy, 19, north Kensington, Niah George, 18, from Hammersmith, Jonathan Oriba, 20, from Notting Hill, Akil Ford, 20, from Clapham, Daniel Talbot, 23, from north Kensington and Yassin Imlahi, 19, from Kensington, all pleaded guilty to the same charge.
Kalan Williamson was jailed for four years and eight months, Conor Murphy was handed a four year detention for conspiracy and eight months for dangerous driving. Jonathan Oriba was sentenced to four years detention, while Niah George got three years and 10 months.
Akil Ford, who had 24 previous convictions, got four years detention, while Daniel Talbot was jailed for four years. Yassin Imlahi got three years detention, as did Rory Mason, who was found guilty by a jury after denying his involvement.
'They posted pictures of their loot on Facebook and sent messages to each other using Blackberry Messenger planning their crimes. They were brazen about their crimes but this eventually led to their downfall.
'These were men who were wrapped up in their own world and driven by by greed and the gangster lifestyle. If an opportunity arose, they would go for it. They were going into properties regardless of people being in or not. Since their arrest we have seen a 48 per cent decrease in burglaries in the Kensington area.
'The sentences passed down today show this kind of crime is totally unacceptable.'
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