Leicester Mercury

Gang behind Khun Vichai Burglary at home jailed

£26 MILLION OF ITEMS IN RAIDS ON THE FAMOUS

- By DAVID OWEN david.owen@reachplc.com

GANG members who broke into the late Leicester City owner Khun Vichai’s London home, and those of other wellknown people, have been jailed.

The thieves stole £26 million in cash, jewellery and gems in a series of raids described as Britain’s biggest burglary spree targeting celebritie­s

Three members of the criminal operation were sentenced at Isleworth Crown Court on Monday.

Italian nationals Jugoslav Jovanovic, 24, Alessandro Maltese, 45, and Alessandro Donati, 44, were behind raids on three properties in 13 days in December 2019.

One of the raids included the Knightsbri­dge residence of Vichai Srivaddhan­aprabha, which had been left as a family shrine to the Foxes chairman after his death, aged 60, alongside four others in the King Power Stadium helicopter disaster in October of the previous year.

The gang targeted the property on December 10, when a TAG Heuer watch he was wearing before he left for Leicester that fateful day was among property worth more than £1 million stolen.

The court heard the burglars even popped a £500 bottle of Cristal champagne to drink as they carried out the raid, and later celebrated with a £760 sushi meal in Knightsbri­dge restaurant Zuma.

The home of former Chelsea FC star and manager, Frank Lampard, 43, and his 42-year-old television presenter wife Christine, was also targeted, alongside that of socialite Tamara Ecclestone.

The court heard Ms Ecclestone, 37, the daughter of ex-Formula 1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone, was on holiday in Lapland with her husband, art gallery owner Jay Rutland, 38, their daughter and their dog, when their mansion in Palace Green, Kensington, was raided on December 13.

Hundreds of items of jewellery, cash, diamonds and precious stones, worth

THIEVES STOLE

£25 million, were stolen in what is believed to have been the country’s biggest ever domestic burglary.

Police said the gang are believed to have carried out similar crimes against high-profile victims across Europe and had planned to commit further raids on the rich and famous in the UK.

Detectives have not revealed the identities of other potential victims, who did not know how close they came to being burgled as the thieves carried out reconnaiss­ance missions and dummy runs.

Jovanovic, Maltese and Donati were extradited from Italy between November 29 and December 18, 2019 and pleaded guilty to conspiracy to burgle over the three raids.

Jovanovic also admitted conspiracy to commit money laundering between December 10, 2019 and January 31 last year, and one count of attempting to convert criminal property.

He was jailed for 11 years by Judge Martin Edmunds QC on Monday, while Maltese and Donati were each sentenced to eight years and nine months in prison.

The men, who were brought to court

under armed police guard as a helicopter flew overhead, will return to Italy to serve their sentences following proceeds of crime proceeding­s in the UK.

Sentencing the trio, Judge Edmunds said: “In November and December 2019, each of you flew in to this country to take your parts in targeting the West London homes of well-known and wealthy people.

“The fact each burglary was accomplish­ed despite the precaution­s of the householde­rs, that so much was stolen and then, it is to be inferred, removed from the country and not recovered, speaks to the overall organisati­on, planning and criminal determinat­ion, together with a willingnes­s to take chances.

“You did so in the hope of substantia­l gain for yourselves but regardless of the loss to those people – not only of objects of financial value but of objects of deep personal significan­ce and of the sense of safety and security anyone is entitled to feel in their own home.”

The judge said the gang had chosen their targets because of the “celebrity of their occupiers”.

“The distress caused by the burglary of a home of householde­rs who may be well-known or wealthy is no less than that caused to those in different circumstan­ces,” he said.

“The acute distress caused to children, or the fear for the safety of children, is a particular feature. There have been life-changing effects on the victims’ own sense of safety.”

A fourth member of the gang, Daniel Vukovic, 44, believed to be a Serbian national who uses a string of aliases, fled to Belgrade, where he is still thought to be following a failed extraditio­n bid.

Prosecutor Timothy Cray QC said he was “the prime mover in organising the team in the UK”, which “planned and executed the highest-value burglaries that have ever come to light” in the country.

Only a handful of items have been recovered, with the rest of the £26 million worth of loot believed to have been taken abroad.

Speaking at the end of the case, Detective Constable Andrew Payne, of the Metropolit­an Police, said: “It’s buried treasure somewhere, globally.

“The plots are comparable to what you would see in a Hollywood movie but, unfortunat­ely, this was real life, involving real victims who have suffered greatly by their actions.”

The Lampards had about £60,000 in watches and jewellery stolen while they were out of their Chelsea property on December 1.

On the way to the final £25 million burglary, Maltese stole a packet of chewing gum from a kiosk at Victoria station as the gang stopped to buy coffee and pastries.

Jovanovic and his uncle Vukovic were later seen on CCTV in Harrods department store spending thousands of pounds on luxury goods and signing up for loyalty cards using fake names.

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 ?? ?? FROM LEFT: The opened bottle of Cristal champagne; Khun Vichai’s Tag Heuer watch; the opened safe; Detective Inspector Ben Mahoney speaks to the press; Khun Vichai. Below headline, from left, Jugoslav Jovanovic, Alessandro Maltese and Alessandro Donati
FROM LEFT: The opened bottle of Cristal champagne; Khun Vichai’s Tag Heuer watch; the opened safe; Detective Inspector Ben Mahoney speaks to the press; Khun Vichai. Below headline, from left, Jugoslav Jovanovic, Alessandro Maltese and Alessandro Donati
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