Brazen act Thief caught on camera taking cooking oil

ATHIEF from Bristol was caught on camera shamelessly stealing cooking oil from a popular Welsh pub, a court heard.

Adrian Gregowicz of Trym Side, Sea Mills, robbed the pub the day after it had received a delivery of oil, although it is not known whether he knew that, nor what he intended to do with the substance.

A judge had previously told Gregowicz that he had a “streak of dishonesty”, referencing previous convictions and cautions for stealing scrap metal, car batteries and cooking oil.

He was sentenced to three months in prison, suspended for 12 months, and ordered to complete 150 hours of unpaid work

According to the prosecution, the Kingsbridge Inn in Gorseinon, Wales, received a delivery of 160 litres of cooking oil on November 23 last year, which was stored in a separate outbuilding.

The next morning, 31-year-old Gregowicz arrived at the pub as a passenger in a Ford Transit van with cloned licence plates. He then went directly to the shed and loaded the 20-litre containers two by two into the van before leaving.

Prosecutor James Hartson said it was clear that the pub was targeted, adding: “there could not have been anything random about this offence”.

As soon as staff discovered the robbery, they checked CCTV and contacted the police.

On the same day, the van was located on the M4 near Cardiff and was stopped by police officers.

Gregowicz told officers that a man had given him a van and offered him a job collecting used oil for a fee of £2 per container. The prosecutor said this was a “false assertion”.

The court heard that the prosecution accepted that the driver of the Transit van had been “duped” by the defendant and believed that the job was legitimate.

Gregowicz admitted burglary. He has four previous convictions for 11 offences.

Judge Huw Rees said pubs had been through tough times in the last couple of years without the added inconvenience of people like Gregowicz “pilfering” from them.

With a 20% discount for his guilty plea the judge sentenced him to three months in prison suspended for 12 months and ordered him to complete 150 hours of unpaid work.

There was a second charge against Gregowicz for the theft of cooking oil from a Frankie and Benny’s restaurant in Swansea on the same date, but the prosecution offered no evidence and the judge recorded a formal not guilty verdict.