Burglar crept into home and stole car – and child’s lunch
A CREEPER burglar broke into a house while the family were asleep upstairs and stole a host of items including paramedic equipment, a motorbike, food from the fridge, and even a child’s packed lunch which had been prepared for school the next day, a court has heard.
Daniel Lee Carmichael then helped himself to the family’s car – which he crashed into railings just 100 yards away before running off.
Swansea Crown Court heard when the defendant was tracked down by police he told them he had been so “Valled up” – had taken so many Valium tablets – that he couldn’t remember going into the house.
Dean Pulling, prosecuting, said on the morning of August 15 this year the various members of a family living on Golwg y Garren Wen in Hafod, Swansea, awoke at different times between 6am and 7am to begin their days.
The first indication that something had happened overnight was when the mother of the family noticed she had received texts from her bank in the early hours of the morning telling her about attempted transactions on her bank card at the Nisa store on St Helen’s Road.
The woman initially thought they may have been scam messages but as the family went about their business they began to find items missing from various downstairs rooms – a backpack containing paramedic equipment, a laptop computer, sunglasses, personal documents including a driving licence, bank cards, food from cupboards and the fridge, and a packed lunch which had been prepared for the one of the teenage children who lived there.
Further checks then showed a motorbike and new mountain bike had been taken from the attached garage, and the family car was missing from the drive.
The court heard the motorbike, with its ignition system damaged, was found dumped in the street outside while the VW car was found around 100 yards away wedged between two sets of railings.
Police were notified, and with the information about the attempted use of the card officers were able to recover CCTV footage of the suspect.
Mr Pulling said over the following month police tried to locate 31-yearold Carmichael, and then on September 16 they received information that he was near the former Hafod Inn on Neath Road.
Officers were dispatched to the scene, and when they arrived they saw him outside the pub.
Carmichael ran into the building – which is now used as flats – and officers followed him inside. In his room police found some of the items stolen during the burglary.
While being arrested he told officers “I know I’m f ***** – I’m going back to prison”, adding “I was Valled-up.”
In his subsequent interview he admitted entering the garage of the Golwg y Garren Wen property but had no memory of anything else.
In a victim impact statement from the mum of the burgled family, which was read to court, she described how she had been felt feeling anxious and nervous, and scared to pop down stairs at night to make a cup of tea. She she was angry that somebody had entered their house and gone through their things.
Carmichael, of Neath Road, Hafod, Swansea, had previously pleaded guilty to burglary, aggravated vehicletaking, and fraud when he appeared in the dock for sentencing. He has previous convictions for 47 offences including aggravated vehicle-taking, burglary, going equipped for theft, and the battery of a former partner.
Dan Griffiths, for Carmichael, said the abuse of drink and drugs had been a “constant theme” in his client’s offending over the years but he had now made enquiries about attending a rehabilitation centre in Scotland upon his eventual release from prison.
He said the defendant has two young children who he is currently prevented from having contact with, a state of affairs which causes him “a great deal of pain”, and said “there can be no better motivation for him to sort his act out”.
Judge Paul Thomas QC told Carmichael that the courts treat burglary seriously because of the distress they cause their victims who never feel safe and secure in their homes again.
Giving the defendant a one-quarter discount for his guilty pleas, the judge sentenced him to two years and four months in prison, comprising two years for burglary and to four months for the aggravated vehicle-taking to run consecutively, with three months for the fraud to run concurrently.
The defendant will serve up to half the two years and four months in prison before being released on licence to serve the remainder in the community.
Carmichael was disqualified from driving for 12 months, the ban extended by another 14 months to take account of time he will be behind bars.
Judge Thomas said he hoped what he had heard about Carmichael’s desire to get clean of drink and drugs and to turn his life around was true, and he wished him well.
But he also wondered whether the defendant had said something similar as he was being sent to prison the last time in 2016.