Whitechapel bank robbers sent to jail

A POLICE INVESTIGATION into a theft of over £200,000 from a Whitechapel bank has ended with two men being convicted of robbery and sent to jail. The two were additionally sentenced for other robberies carried out across London.

Snaresbrook Crown Court heard that on 1st July last year, staff came in to work at a bank in Whitechapel Road, E1 – to find that the bank had been broken in to over the weekend. Five cash machines had been cut open and money was missing – amounting to, it was later revealed, around £210,039.

Police checked CCTV and saw two men posing as workmen outside the bank. One was wearing a high-vis jacket and he went into a manhole outside the bank. The two men went over to a van and then came back, going into a building site beside the bank  from where, it transpired, they then broke into the bank. The pair were seen carrying various bags from the bank to their van until the early hours of the morning. They returned the following day and took further bags.

The two men were later identified as Paul Thompson, 50, of Carlisle Avenue, Ealing and Jason Perry, 48, of Clover Court, Waltham Forest. The two went on to commit five further robberies over the next few weeks:
•stealing alcohol worth over £2,500 from a supermarket on Lea Bridge Road;
•taking goods and over £5,500 in cash from a shop in Rom Valley Way, RM7;
•taking goods and over £1,000 in cash from a shop in N18;
•taking goods worth over £4,000 from a shop in Rom Valley Way, RM7;
•attempting to break into a bank on High Road, Ilford.
The robbery spree finally came to an end on 15th September, when police – who had been watching them – stopped the pair as they broke into Leyton Leisure Centre. Their homes were searched and evidence of their involvement in the previous burglaries was found.

Thompson pleaded guilty to bring involved in four burglaries and to stealing a car last summer.  He was sentenced to three years in jail.  Perry pleased guilty to involvement in six burglaries and was sentenced to eight years in jail.

Detective Constable David Reed from the Metropolitan Police Flying Squad said, “Both Perry and Thompson are career burglars who targeted multiple businesses over the course of four months, causing significant losses. The offences were carefully planned and included accessing manhole covers to cut cables in order to disable CCTV and alarm systems.

“Despite this, as a direct result of a proactive operation led by the Met’s Flying Squad, strong evidence was obtained connecting them to these crimes leaving them little choice but to admit their involvement. Had they not been caught, I am certain they would have gone onto commit further offences and they are now rightly behind bars where they belong.”

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