Episode 3 Caught Red Handed

Thieves will steal our cars, our valuables,

just about anything they can get their hands on.

To cut down on crime and antisocial behaviour,

the police and other agencies are using new tactics

and technology, where the bad guys actually get caught in the act.

Brilliant footage. Police officers love CCTV.

Local councils, shops and businesses are laying some traps of their own.

As soon as he walked into the picture I knew who he was.

And the general public, too,

can help unsuspecting crooks get their comeuppance.

We definitely needed proof.

You're not going to get away with it, you might as well pack up.

It made me swallow with pride, it was brilliant.

So anyone who's up to no good had better think twice.

They might just get caught red-handed.

Today, a jewellery snatch.

The raider's fast, but the shop staff are faster.

It's so much quicker than I remember.

-I'm like a ninja!

-SHE LAUGHS

Quick thinking and quick footed, they run rings around the raider.

Also today, their mum's money is being stolen,

so the family fakes some banknotes to set a cunning trap.

We photocopied a couple of £20 notes.

We had put there the bait

and we was waiting to see what would be taken.

And not so much smash and grab as grab and smash.

It's a demolition derby

when a dodgy driver makes off with a precious motor.

These are the views from CCTV cameras in and around

a jewellery shop in the historic city of Winchester.

All they usually capture is the sight of customers browsing

and buying what's on offer,

but these cameras have a bit of history themselves.

Over the last few years...they've caught a few criminals, too.

An armed gang targeted this shop two years running.

We previously featured it on this programme.

When three men run into your store wearing dark clothing,

gloves and balaclavas, it's pretty frightening.

When they pull up a gun, it's terrifying.

The first time, the robbers were successful.

They actually got away with a quarter of a million pounds' worth of jewellery.

But the second time, the jewellers were ready for them

with some new security equipment.

Everything we had planned worked perfectly.

Some of the gang ended up in prison.

Then, just recently, a man walks up to the shop and goes inside.

Now, he clearly hasn't watched our previous programmes, naughty boy.

If he had, he probably wouldn't attempt what he's about to do here.

These staff are skilled at making and selling jewellery,

but they've also become highly experienced in the art of catching crooks.

Jeremy France first opened his doors in Winchester 25 years ago.

As the turnover grew, so did the chance of being turned over.

Any jeweller is a target, and the larger the volume or amount

of jewellery you carry, then the more likely you are to be a target.

And the criminals have a lot of time on their hands to watch you

and to decide how to rob you. We have to stay one step ahead and we do.

We do it through our own trade, our insurers

and through our own perseverance and watching.

Jeremy invested in a fog cloaking system, which prevents

robbers from seeing the jewellery and drives them out of the shop.

He also installed a sprayer,

which marks thieves with special encoded liquid.

Once it's on, it doesn't come off again.

It is always in the path of the exit.

That gives us time to hit the button so they run under it,

it activates, and you cannot get past it.

And because of the liquid's unique code,

it directly links the criminal to the jewellery shop.

In the police station, every criminal is tested for the DNA liquid.

If you have it on you, you were there. It's 100% conviction rate.

But it seems some thieves still reckon it's worth the risks...

if they get in and out quick enough.

Well, let's just see if they're right.

It's mid-afternoon on a weekday.

While there's a quiet moment with no customers, Larissa,

one of the sales staff, is playing a game with Buster, Jeremy's puppy.

Not exactly a guard dog.

Larissa works in the jewellers on a temporary basis.

She spends most of her time on the high seas.

I have been in the Merchant Navy since I was 19,

but always worked in other fields such as jewellers

and shoe shops in between ships, so you would think that my danger

and excitement comes from being in the Merchant Navy.

However, it seems to be that it's more at the jewellers.

A little while later, a man walks into the shop.

The gentleman came in,

I obviously got up from playing with the puppy and approached him.

And he was... Nothing suspicious.

He was quite quiet, quite calm.

The man asks to look at two gold bracelets from the window display.

Just had the two straight out and was asking him

what he was looking for and for a reason -

was it for a birthday or present or anything?

And he said it was for his sister's birthday.

And he said he was worried about the size of her wrists

and that she had quite large wrists, which I thought was quite weird,

cos he was quite a smaller framed gentleman.

Other staff walk into the sales area.

The man picks one of the bracelet up

to check the size against his own wrist.

-Larissa senses a slight change in his behaviour.

-He was kind of...

It wasn't quite agitated cos it wasn't that bold,

cos I think I would have noticed it more,

but he was a little bit kind of skittish.

He made his excuses and had to go and make a phone call, so he stepped

outside the shop and I just said that I'd keep the bracelets aside for him.

The man leaves and wanders out of camera view.

Almost 20 minutes later he returns and is greeted by Buster.

Larissa is dealing with another customer.

By now, Jeremy has arrived at work

and is holding a meeting in the back office.

Although I'm at the back doing business,

I am actually watching at the same time.

Jeremy's daughter Harriet comes through to see if she can help the man,

but he insists on waiting for Larissa.

I knew what bracelets he wanted to see and the reasons why,

so he had kind of established a story, so to speak.

This man was quite clever. He actually built up a rapport,

he came back several times, he asked questions.

He put us to ease, if you like.

But Larissa is still dealing with her customer.

The man steps outside again for another phone call.

Someone will pop outside to make a phone call,

but to do it two times in such a short space, it was quite unusual.

Another couple of minutes go by.

Then he comes in again and waits for Larissa.

Finally, Larissa is free to serve the man again.

I got... Placed the bracelets out in front of him again,

and it was at this point he was quite quiet

and quite hesitant with conversation.

I imagine there's a wee drop of adrenaline running around.

And then I could tell that something was going to happen

because of the way he was picking up the bracelets.

He picked up the two together and it was kind of fumbled.

I did make good eye contact with him,

but he was trying hard to look down at the bracelets.

At that moment, it did feel like it was a lifetime,

although it was only half a second.

I could see that he was going to do it.

And he does.

He sprints for the front door,

but can he make it through before Larissa locks it?

She reaches for the button with razor-sharp reflexes.

He's still got a few feet to go.

She presses the button. He's trapped.

My initial reaction was to lock that door.

We've done a lot of training to...

The first thing you do is to lock that door,

and knowing where the lock was was key,

and luckily it was right by my side.

This is Larissa's reaction run at normal speed.

Bam! The door's locked. That was fast!

Buster, the puppy, runs for cover

as the man starts to shout threats and pulls on the door in a frenzy.

Not always a good idea to lock a door with criminals,

especially if they have guns,

but when it's a snatch it's not a bad idea.

It gives you thinking space, and, well, Larissa was thinking.

I shouted for Jeremy, to get his attention,

and went to hit the panic button.

The reason was to make sure that the traceable liquid was activated.

The man is soaked in the encoded liquid,

permanent proof that he has been at the scene of the crime.

Now Jeremy has to decide what to do next.

He was extremely violent, he was kicking and smashing the door,

swearing at us, threatening us with violence if we didn't open the door.

I had to make a decision whether we waited for the police to arrive and

make an easier arrest, or let him go and therefore not endanger my staff.

The decision was very simple, we let him go.

Which I did, and then put my hands up to show to him that I'd

unlocked the door and wasn't right to do anything else afterwards.

Later, the jewellery thief legs it, but Jeremy is in hot pursuit.

It was about here that he just literally stopped

and turned around, and of course my heart jumped into my throat.

Now, maybe it's time to call Ghostbusters,

as this lost soul sets out to steal some spirits.

But these spirits are a little bit more worldly,

and this is a story that's probably going to come back

and haunt him for some time.

It's after midnight and what's this moving silently through

the aisles of this off-licence? Is it a ghostly apparition?

Well, maybe. But my money is on it being a burglar

hiding under a bedsheet with eyeholes cut out so he can see.

And this troubled soul isn't here to haunt anyone.

He just wants to spirit away some of the alcohol.

And with that in mind, heads for the stock room.

He seems to know what he wants, but as he bends to pick it up,

the flimsy costume falls forward and the eyeholes move out of position.

Realising he hasn't got a ghost of a chance

of carrying things out in this state, he bottles it.

His identity remains shrouded in mystery...

..but hopefully the Ghostbusters will catch up with him soon.

Now to a serious betrayal of trust.

They call it financial abuse, when someone takes advantage

of their position to steal from the vulnerable.

This bedroom belongs to Mavis and Stan,

an elderly couple from Plymouth, Devon.

Money has been going missing from the room, so their family

have set a trap for the thief, using a hidden camera and fake banknotes.

That's Mavis's carer and friend.

She's come upstairs on her own to collect a fresh towel.

There's no need for her to venture further into the room...

..and yet she does.

It was sickening in that the real sad thing was it was sad for Mother.

The fake money flushes out a false friend.

Sadly, since these events, Mavis has passed away,

but her family want the full story to be told.

Mavis, a former nurse,

did a fair bit of caring herself in her lifetime.

She leaves behind a large family, including seven children.

Son Gary is the youngest of the boys.

Four boys, three girls, and we have two stepbrothers and a stepsister.

It's a lot to keep happy.

Even so, Mavis managed to do so, together with Stan,

her second husband, who she was with for 40 years.

The perfect wife.

She's do anybody a favour. She was that type of person.

She was one in one million. She really was.

In her late 70s, Mavis's health goes downhill.

The family rally round.

But, as time goes by,

they realise Mavis needs more help than they can differ.

We decided, you know, with mother saying, yes, it would be OK,

to get a care worker in to start helping out.

Various care workers come in, but there's one who Mavis

forms a particular attachment to.

She was seen to be a perfect person.

More than anything, my mother used to like to have a chin-wag, a chat.

Mavis soon asks if her new friend

can take over more of the care worker shifts.

As she got more friendly, Mum let her go upstairs

and she would pick up the towels and all that.

Then, one day, Gary hears some alarming news.

I had a phone call from one of my sisters to say

that they thought that £1,000 has gone missing,

but they couldn't be sure because obviously it was mother's money

and it was just all in a drawer.

Mavis has £300 collected from the bank for her each week.

She's from a generation that likes to have cash in the house,

but she rarely gets through it all, so she puts the rest in an envelope.

When it reaches £1,000, her daughters seal the envelope

and put it away in a bedroom drawer.

They think she has managed to save up several thousand pounds.

From then, really, we kept a closer eye on it

and, within a week, another £2,000 had gone missing.

But who is taking the envelopes?

We are a close, honest family with each other.

We knew that it had to be an outsider.

Only one carer, Jennifer, ever goes upstairs.

She's supposed to come to here, open the Ottoman -

as you can see, towels - take a towel and go down.

The family believe she hasn't been stopping there.

Then she's come here, she's had to go through all these drawers, which is

six of them, to find that, finally, in this drawer here,

this is where the money was.

Suspicion isn't, however, proof.

To convince the police,

and Mavis herself, they need to catch the carer in the act.

Luckily, Gary has a friend in the surveillance business who

offers to set up a hidden camera.

The camera was set up in a corner above the door.

It just looked like a burglar alarm.

You wouldn't suspect nothing.

Next, they need to set a trap, but don't want Mavis to lose any

more money, so they decide to try their hands at counterfeiting.

We photocopied a couple of £20 notes

and put all white paper in between,

put the envelopes back in

and sealed them and we was waiting to see what would be taken.

And it doesn't take long for the bait to be taken.

First morning, she walks into the bedroom,

past the box of towels and goes straight to the top drawer.

She has a quick rummage, possibly to see what's there,

then heads back downstairs.

Two days later, she goes past the towels again,

checks the money drawer for a few seconds

before leaving empty-handed.

Perhaps she's lost her nerve.

Oh, no. Maybe Friday's a better day for thieving.

After collecting a clean towel,

this calculating woman can't resist the lure of the cash any longer

and takes an envelope from the drawer.

Little does she know it's full of photocopies and plain paper.

It's not easy to see but that little dark shape there is the envelope.

She tucks it into her trousers as she leaves the room.

The family watch the images they caught on camera.

It was sickening in that the real sad thing was it was sad for Mother.

Cried. Constantly cried. You know, "How could she?

"For all what I've done for her." She couldn't believe that she

could do such a thing to her cos she trusted her so much.

We had a job to do and our next job was to phone the police to

get them around to obviously press charges.

But this so-called friend already knows she's been found out.

Once she left this house, she realised that she was caught

cos once she opened the envelope she realised it was paper.

She immediately resigns from her position at the care company and

when the police arrive she hands over an envelope containing £1,000.

The one containing the fake paper notes,

she had already thrown in the bin.

In court, she is found guilty of theft and attempted theft

and is sentenced to 40 weeks in prison, suspended for two years.

The judge also ordered that she pays a large sum

in compensation to the family.

The hidden camera has done its job well.

If you don't catch them in the act, there will be no charges.

We were told that by the police - if you never had the CCTV,

you wouldn't have had a conviction.

Mavis didn't live to see her carer brought to trial.

After suffering a fall at home, she went into hospital

and passed away two weeks later.

We had a good sendoff for her.

The family were very close, all stood together.

It's a big loss to me.

Yes.

Although this business was a strain and stress for her,

the family are determined not to let it taint the happy memories

of Mavis's last years.

We all love our mother and we'll never forget her.

She was such a beautiful woman, my wife, no two ways about that.

If, like Mavis's family,

we suspect someone we trust his stealing from us, what should we do?

If it's money that being stolen,

think about marking the serial numbers.

If, for any investigation, we were to arrest somebody, the first

thing we would look is to try and identify that that £20 was your £20.

In order to gather the evidence

to actually prove that the thefts are taking place,

there is an awful lot of very good technology and kit out there.

Covert cameras can be hidden inside a pen, inside a flowerpot.

DNA-encoded liquid.

Once you've put this on to your property, if it's stolen

then the police recover it,

we can track it back and trace it to your household.

Don't keep large amounts of money in the house.

A bank will have much better security than you will.

Call your local police.

Get some advice from them and then take it from there.

Coming up, jeweller Jeremy is chasing a bracelet snatcher.

I was screaming out, "Stop! He's a jewellery thief!"

Can he bag this not-so-diamond geezer?

But first, car crime.

Some criminals don't like spending their own money on cars.

They'd rather steal ours.

This next car thief, though,

hasn't counted on the owner using some top gear to track him down.

This car isn't just any car.

It's a limited edition rally Subaru and Simon's pride and joy.

There's only about 30 left now on the road, so it's a very rare thing.

But his rare classic motor almost becomes a thing of the past

when a serial car thief jumps in to steal it.

Thankfully, his bungled getaway is far from classic.

We are in a village just outside Otley, near Leeds.

This family-run car dealership has been here since the 1950s.

Started about 60 years ago by my grandad.

It's then been passed down to obviously my father,

and then now it's myself and my sister

that are mainly involved in the business.

Simon runs the repair workshop...

How's it going?

..but cars aren't just his family's business,

they're also his personal passion.

Yeah, it's something that I love, really, so...

Although that's quite sad.

Simon goes rallying and his own car is a much sought-after Subaru.

The car is a special edition for Colin McRae, the rally driver,

but beyond that it does have a lot of sentimental value

cos it was the first car I bought with my own money. It's the car

that my fiancee learned to drive in and just so many memories, really.

But one dark day, contact with his cherished motor is broken.

It's near closing time and Simon's about to check his car's oil level.

I just brought it in before I went home, so I just left it there

while I walked into the showroom to grab some of my stuff.

Before he knows it, there's the sound of a familiar engine revving,

followed by a loud crash.

It wasn't just a slight bang, it was a real smash and wallop.

CCTV cameras capture the sight of Simon's car leaving the garage

and the door looks badly damaged. Simon runs through to the workshop.

It was just a state of destruction, really.

There was oil everywhere, glass all on the floor.

He races outside.

We just saw him driving off down the road as we got to the forecourt.

I thought I'd never see it again and I'd never own another one

cos really it is almost irreplaceable now.

Simon and his colleagues rally round.

They call the police and check their CCTV footage

to piece together what's happened.

They see a man walking onto the forecourt.

He got dropped off just on the main road there by another car,

which then drove off and left him.

Obviously, he's looking inside the cars here, trying to see

if there's any keys in the ignition, but they were all locked.

The man enters the service area.

Obviously there was no-one in the workshop, which is quite unusual.

The way out is narrow and lined with gear,

so there's not much room for manoeuvre.

Reverses it flat-out down the workshop and he's got the door

open and he catches the door on the oil drum, which knocks the drum over.

He then starts reversing again

and then the door gets caught on the wall there, at which point the glass

smashes, he's cut his arm open on the door, there's blood everywhere.

As well as hurting himself, the thief's damaged the car.

It was difficult seeing it, obviously, with all the damage

and everything. It's quite upsetting.

But Simon's beloved car is protected by some smart technology.

The car actually has a tracker system fitted

so we phoned the tracker company, told them what had happened

and they immediately activated the system.

It means the police can find out its whereabouts...and they do.

The thief left the car abandoned at a train station,

but with it he left behind some important evidence.

There was blood over the door,

so obviously the police could then use his DNA.

The police collect the CCTV footage and hold the car for forensic tests.

Then, finally, Simon gets his dream wheels back.

Obviously, it was a massive relief to me.

I was overjoyed they'd found it complete.

The DNA test results reveal the thief is 29-year-old Duane Kale.

He is arrested and admits to stealing Simon's car and two others.

In court, he's sentenced to three years in prison.

The Subaru is repaired and is now back to its pristine condition.

I'm really grateful to the police for their work in getting the car back.

Obviously it's a really nice feeling that I've got back again and,

yeah, still using it everyday.

And, yeah, just feel very grateful that I can still drive it, really.

We're in a Winchester jewellery shop.

A thief has snatched two gold bracelets.

Quick-thinking sales assistant Larissa has locked

the door in a flash and made sure he was doused in traceable liquid.

He was quite aggressive, which was quite scary, but I knew,

looking at Jeremy, waiting for his instruction,

I knew he wouldn't put me in any harm's way.

The shop owner, Jeremy, has given the order to let the thief out

and then decides to chase after him.

My decision was to track him.

He was covered in a DNA-coded liquid.

He was going to get convicted of the crime,

but only if we knew who he was and we could find him.

He asks for a phone so he can update police on the thief's whereabouts.

My staff are very quick and I had a phone in my hand in a second.

Then he heads out after the thief.

There was a lot of people on the other side of the road

and I was screaming out, "Stop! He's a jewellery thief!"

And, of course, you're kind of hoping

that somebody will do something but they just didn't.

Even though there's some shouting,

the thief doesn't realise he's being followed.

Jeremy keeps his distance and phones the police.

At the danger 50-something and running with a phone in your hand,

there was a lot of panting going on.

They realised that I was giving chase and they were taking my information,

they were passing it on to the squad cars that were in the area.

While Jeremy continues to track the thief,

another police unit arrives at the shop.

Larissa goes in search of Buster,

the puppy who had a scary time during the theft.

We actually found him under the chair, cowering and shaking,

so I spent the time kind of looking after him

and not really thinking about my own fear.

It wasn't till afterwards, I was being interviewed,

that I did think, "That was quite a scary situation

"and it could have got a lot worse,"

which is when you start thinking about the what-ifs.

I think that's when you start getting a bit scared of what

could have happened.

Meanwhile, Jeremy follows the thief into some backstreets.

Then the man turns left into an alleyway.

I stopped. A few moments later, he came back,

fully changed into completely different clothing.

The thief now realises Jeremy is on his tail

and starts to look threatening.

But Jeremy has set out to track the man for the police,

not fight with him.

And I made the right decision.

I stepped back and I literally waved him through.

Strangely, he allowed me to follow him

and he knew I was following him at this point.

The man eventually climbs a high, spiked fence and escapes...

but not for long.

Because when the police arrived, Jeremy shows them the alleyway

where the man got changed and they find his discarded clothes.

Very fortunately, when they did a DNA test

on the sweat around the hat, they found this man was on record.

Three days later, they broke down his door and made the arrest.

The man admits to stealing the two gold bracelets straightaway.

Pointless to deny it when covered in coded liquid.

In court, he is sentenced to four months in prison,

suspended for 18.

He is also given a supervision order

and has to undergo drug rehabilitation treatment.

Before he was sentenced, the man told police which pawnbrokers

he had sold the stolen jewellery to.

It was recovered by the police and returned to us,

and that's a first in my 25 years in this business.

Larissa, whose quick reactions led to the thief being caught,

gets to see the video footage again.

Oh, my God, it was so much quicker than I remember.

That's so weird.

It's crazy fast. I'm like a ninja.

That's it for today.

Join us next time, when police and the public

will be catching more criminals red-handed.