Episode 19 Caught Red Handed

Thieves will steal our cash, our cars, our valuables -

just about anything they can get their hands on.

But now, the police are using cutting-edge technology to

catch the bad guys.

You want to make sure you've got a concrete case.

Enough evidence to convince a court.

Local councils, shops and businesses are fighting crime

with their own tricks and traps.

Just unbelievable that she thinks she can get away with this.

And the public are using secret cameras

to make sure their crooks get their comeuppance.

Fair means or foul, I was going to get rid of him.

I thought, "We've got her!"

And I was so happy. Thank God!

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

they might just get caught red-handed.

Today, hairdresser Jenny is distraught that her salon is raided

by burglars twice in a fortnight.

One uses a crowbar to smash his way in.

Another uses his backside to bash his way in.

But Jenny finds some important evidence the intruder left behind.

I was pleased that we found it.

I felt we were piecing together a puzzle.

I wasn't going to rest until I got them.

Also today, builder Chris can't find his cement mixer.

Maybe he's got things all mixed up.

It starts your mind thinking, "I DID leave it there, didn't I?"

I thought, "It was there this morning, I know it was."

Can Chris solve the missing mixer mystery?

Also later, Martin and Linda are trying to raise funds for treatment

that could save their daughter Kelly's life.

But someone's been stealing the money that people are donating.

It's a stab in my heart.

Who the heck would do that to us?

The family set out to track down the heartless thief,

then discover he's not the only person stealing money

meant for their daughter.

Big businesses have always been able to afford effective security.

But now that CCTV is getting cheaper, thieves had best beware,

because there are eyes watching you everywhere.

Even a hair salon in a small town.

Strood is part of London's commuter belt.

In the town centre, Jenny runs a hair salon.

And HER roots are in this area, too.

She grew up in the town and has lived here most of her adult life.

Her first-ever job was as a Saturday girl

at a nearby hairdresser's, when she was just 13.

I used to hair wash, sweep the floor, make teas and coffees.

Just assist, really.

Jenny worked her way up to become a fully-qualified hairstylist.

And then she decided at the age of 26 to open her own salon.

It was a big risk, but I was quite established, and I just thought,

"Do it and go and branch out on my own."

Jenny enjoys training younger proteges, like Harman.

Are you blow-drying now?

Jenny is a very fun, enthusiastic character.

That's why I work here, because of her.

I've got a fabulous, fabulous team.

I couldn't do anything else. Love my job.

But Jenny's upbeat attitude to life at her salon is about

to come under threat because of a burglary.

In fact, two burglaries in quick succession.

It's 8:30 on a Monday morning in spring.

Harman arrives at the salon to open up, and is shocked by what he finds.

I saw the reception, and I was like, "What happened here?

"Why is it all a mess?"

Then I went to the stock room.

The safe had literally been ripped out.

All the products and everything just chucked everywhere.

Then I went out to the back and that's when I saw the bathroom,

and there's a massive hole in the window.

He calls Jenny and she rushes in.

There was stock everywhere, CCTV had been stolen, camera smashed up.

Had the salon five years, I've built it up on my own,

and then someone just comes in and does that - it's just awful,

horrible to see.

As it all sinks in, they start to realise the extent

of what's been taken.

All the tip jars got stolen, there was quite a lot of money in them.

£100, roughly.

And obviously, since Christmas, we were building it up and then

for someone to just take that, it's a bit like, "Whoa..."

And the tip jars are not all that's missing.

We had raffle money, that all got stolen.

Petty cash got stolen.

Float got stolen.

In the safe there was just short of a grand of cash

and an expensive pair of clippers.

It's like a week's worth of wages that puts me back off,

I've still got to pay everyone.

Jenny calls the police,

and knowing they'll need to look for forensic evidence,

she feels she has no choice but to shut up shop for the day.

It was our late-night as well, so we've lost a whole day's money,

it really affected us.

As they wait for the police,

Jenny remembers that even though the salon's own CCTV system was stolen,

there are other security cameras nearby that might have

filmed the crooks.

I thought, "Oh, but thank God, our building is monitored by CCTV."

We went upstairs and got it and we watched it.

What the outside cameras have recorded comes as a shock.

Late the previous night,

a man creeps towards the back of the salon.

He's carrying a crowbar.

The man uses both hands to lift it,

and smash one of the salon's windows.

He starts to reach in.

This camera's footage ends here.

But images from another of the building's cameras show the face

of the burglar who broke in to the salon.

And he appears to have an accomplice.

Neither of them is carrying the crowbar.

So Jenny thinks they must have discarded it.

She goes out to search the nearby streets,

and finds it next to a wall.

I was pleased that we found it.

I felt like we were piecing together a puzzle.

And when the police forensic team arrive, there's more good news.

Where the safe was, they found a bloody fingerprint

right at the back.

The police take away the CCTV and the crowbar Jenny found

as they seek to identify the men.

Jenny cleans up the mess and boards the window

so she can reopen the salon.

We're just a small business.

You know, it's hard enough for us to survive, anyway.

In the days that follow,

Jenny tries to earn back some of the money she's lost.

But less than a fortnight after the break-in,

the routine of her salon is shattered again -

along with another of its windows.

It's just gone midnight and a suspicious-looking man loiters

outside the salon.

He has a brick and he throws it at the salon's front window.

But it doesn't completely smash the reinforced glass panel.

So, he tries to smash through the salon's front door.

But again, fails.

So he hits upon an unusual, rather desperate tactic.

He starts ramming the door with his rear end to try to break through the panel.

For the next 15 minutes,

the man uses this rather comic combination of brick and backside

to try to fashion a hole big enough to wriggle through.

Eventually, he succeeds.

He's in the salon for ten minutes before he comes crawling out.

The next morning, Jenny gets a call at home saying her salon's

been broken into yet again.

"What? No, no way!"

I've come running down here,

and it was just a shock seeing a massive hole in my front door.

It doesn't look good cos when we're opening, we've got no shop front.

It looks like the ghetto salon.

The shop's takings are no longer kept on the premises.

So, all the burglar's got away with is the float in the till.

But he's caused hundreds of pounds' worth of damage.

He's done it all for £40.

£40 float.

Feeling that her business is under siege,

Jenny takes the drastic action of sleeping in the salon overnight.

I didn't have an alarm, I didn't have any cameras,

I just had wooden boards on the front of the shop.

And I thought, if someone wanted to come through,

they could just come back and clean me out.

And this is all I have.

That was the only option I had, was to stay in, protecting myself.

After camping out in the salon for three nights,

Jenny decides she wants to help the police solve these burglaries.

So, she puts the CCTV images of all three suspects on social media.

After the second break-in, I was at my wits' end,

and I wasn't going to rest until I got them.

So, I put it online.

We've got a really good, loyal client base.

I think they were really upset for us.

You know, they can see we all work so hard.

They really helped us, share the posts and get it to go viral.

Information about the men in the pictures comes flooding in.

I've received names, I've received addresses.

We then pass that information onto the police and then let them

deal with the matter.

Aided by Jenny's leads,

police are able to track down and arrest all three men.

The public and my clients really, really helped us, so I'm thankful.

With all the evidence stacked up against them,

all three burglars realised there's no escape.

In court, the man who used a crowbar to break into Jenny's salon received

a 23-month sentence for numerous burglaries.

His partner in crime pleaded guilty to burglary and was sent to prison

for 18 months.

The man who broke into the salon the second time also pleaded guilty.

He was sentenced to 26 weeks' imprisonment,

suspended for 12 months.

After being broken into twice in such a short space of time,

Jenny has improved the salon's defences.

We've got more cameras, we've got an alarm now.

Hopefully fingers crossed, we won't have any more break-ins.

Jenny and her team are looking forward to more highlights than

lowlights in the future.

This year we're going to do lots of competitions,

so we are all excited as a salon about that, so watch out!

There we are, my darling. Do you like it?

All done.

Unfortunately, for people who've been through the distress of being

burgled, there's an increased chance of it happening again.

So, what can people do to avoid becoming a repeat victim of crime?

Offenders talk amongst themselves.

Burglars will talk amongst themselves about

the success they've had at various properties.

Those individuals that have targeted your house before have

a good idea that you're likely to replace items,

particularly if you've been insured.

So thinking about boxes that you leave out on the drive for

recycling, think about packaging,

think about these things that may advertise, "Oh, I've had these items

"replaced, come back and take them."

What you need to do is reassess the security on your home,

the security on your lights and your alarm system, window locks,

door locks and the items that you leave on display.

Invest in some crime prevention.

That could be a sticker in the window saying, "No cold callers."

It could be a sticker in the window saying, "We have CCTV or a dog."

If you are a victim of crime,

most forces in the country provide a service where actually officers,

specially trained officers, crime prevention officers,

will come do a survey of your property and give you suitable

advice and recommendations of how you can make it safer.

And now, this drive-thru burger bar

is about to become a climb-thru.

This woman has pulled up in her car in the early hours, to find

the fast food restaurant closed,

but the serving hatch has been left unlocked.

So she's decided on a bit of a self-service.

The thirsty thief starts by pilfering some pop,

but her appetite for crime soon increases and she tries,

with some difficulty, to wriggle in through the window.

Unknown to her, every move of this undignified entrance

is caught on camera.

Next, the woman decides to go large and raid the restaurant

for whatever she can get her hands on.

But the butter-fingered thief struggles to keep hold of her booty.

And this isn't just a BURGER-LARY,

the woman eventually scrambles out with over a grand in cash as well as

other food items.

When police post this clip online...

..she's identified,

which means she's had her chips

and won't be having a happy meal for quite some time.

Chris and his wife Jackie live in Wells in Somerset.

They grew up in villages near here,

and have never felt the need to leave the area.

Wells is quite quiet, it's quite sleepy,

it's low in crime and it's just nice and friendly.

It's such a lovely area, you've got city, countryside, everything, so, why worry?

Chris took up building shortly after he and Jackie got married in 1986.

We bought our first house when I was 19, and it needed renovating.

So, my father-in-law, who was a builder,

was advising us how to do it and all the rest of it, and I thought,

"I like this."

Chris went to college to learn the trade,

then started his own business and hasn't looked back for 30 years.

Going into someone's house,

when they've been thinking about an idea for, like, two or three years,

and actually make it happen and they come out and go, "Wow,"

it gives you a good feeling.

As well as raising their kids, Callum and Victoria,

the couple have also either built or renovated all the homes they've lived in.

Their latest project is converting a small bungalow into a larger house.

It's hard graft, but it's rewarding as well.

Ultimately, you get to live in something a lot better than what you

could normally afford to buy.

Though the couple generally agree about how to renovate their houses,

they didn't see eye-to-eye about fitting CCTV into their latest home.

In one of our other houses,

somebody broke into the shed and nicked some tools.

And I've had one ever since.

I thought it was a complete waste of money.

We were living in Wells, who's ever going to nick anything

or come up our drive?

But that's exactly what does happen.

And Jackie ends up being thankful that they have security cameras

poised to film the dirty deed.

It's a Monday in the summer,

and Chris is driving home after working on a project in Bristol.

I was just finishing off a job

which I managed to finish off by one o'clock,

and it weren't worth starting anything else,

so I thought I'd come home and do three hours' laying patio slabs.

Chris plans to use his cement mixer,

which is pictured here in a photo from a few months earlier.

But when he gets home, he notices that it isn't where he left it.

Drove through the driveway,

looked at the space where the mixer was, thinking, "Who's had my mixer?"

Thinking, "Did I actually have it there?"

And I thought, "No, it was there this morning. I know it was."

Chris goes inside and rewinds security camera footage to try and

solve the mystery.

He's stunned when he sees that, two hours earlier,

there is a white van on his property which isn't supposed to be there.

I was surprised to see a van reversing up the drive

and a woman getting out and a bloke sliding across the seat to get out

as well, open the side door,

pick it up like it was nothing, put it in the van, put the stand on top,

shut the door, and drive out.

50 seconds, in and out and gone. Unbelievable.

The heavy piece of equipment is worth £400.

Chris is gutted it's gone.

How people can just come waltzing, take it without a blink of an eye,

you know, this is our home, this is a place where we should all feel safe.

You know, it is only a cement mixer, but it still,

I still feel violated by them coming in and just pinching stuff,

and it's a horrible feeling.

Chris takes the video to the local police station and reports the crime.

Then he shows the clip to his family when they get home.

They are outraged by the brazen theft.

You're annoyed that you're trying to be a law-abiding citizen and

work hard, and somebody comes along and blatantly takes something

that belongs to you.

The family decides to do a bit of digging around for information.

Wells isn't a large place.

And if the thieves are locals, then someone may know who they are.

My daughter said, "I'll put it on Facebook and see if anyone recognises them."

And then, within an hour, you had 24 replies.

We were inundated, everybody seemed to know exactly who it was.

When you've got 24 people saying it's the same people,

it's got to be, isn't it?

Chris doesn't use social media,

but he's pleased that the rest of his family does.

It was quite remarkable, actually,

how people monitor what's going on all the time, which is a good thing.

I mean, it's just nice to know that there are people around willing to

support you in any situation like that.

The police track down and arrest the couple whose names were given to Chris.

Initially, they claim they were

picking up the cement mixer for a friend.

But soon realise that no-one believes them.

In court, the pair pleaded guilty and were ordered to pay nearly £300

each in fines, costs and compensation.

Chris was delighted the thieves hadn't gotten away with the crime.

Definitely glad they were caught so they could be named and shamed,

basically, and then everybody knew

that these people are thieving people.

You know, if you see them around your van or anything,

tell them to go away.

And Jackie now admits that it was

the right decision to install the CCTV system.

I did have to swallow my words,

because I had complained about the fact that he spent money on it.

So...yeah, he was right on that one.

A man steals donations intended

to help save the life of a 17-year-old girl.

Then, a different thief steals donations meant for the same

good cause from another shop nearby.

The girl's parents are outraged.

But, there's a chance security cameras can help catch these callous thieves.

Dover in Kent -

home to Martin and Linda and their 17-year-old daughter, Kelly.

Kelly is just so gorgeous.

I remember when she was born, it was such a wonderful experience in life.

And as a kid, she was always fun-loving, a real tinker.

She's our only child, and she's like my best friend, really.

I just love her to bits.

When she was 15, Kelly started to suffer from severe stomach pains.

Following hospital tests and scans, the family received

the terrible news that she had a very rare and lethal

type of cancer.

I couldn't believe it.

Kelly started crying, oh, it's just hard to describe,

but it was awful and I didn't know how to console her and I couldn't

believe it myself.

The family were given hope when they found a hospital in New York which

might be able to help Kelly, but it was a shock

when they were told how much the treatment would cost.

Martin dropped to his knees,

showed me the estimated bill

would be 1,200,000, and...

..I was so shocked and disappointed.

But, you know, you just can't let your child die.

No, you have to do something.

The family began a fundraising campaign.

Linda took a redundancy package from work and Martin semi-retired so they

could put all their energy into raising money.

We went about it by setting up a Facebook page, a Twitter page.

The local papers have been good at supporting us,

as have the local media.

Many people in Dover took Kelly's plight to their hearts.

Martin and Linda left collection tins in businesses all over town.

And after nearly two years,

the family had raised almost two-thirds of the money they needed

for the treatment in New York.

Every single coin that goes into any collecting boxes, counts.

But then, as if Martin, Linda,

and Kelly didn't have enough to contend with,

they find that someone is stealing their donation money.

It's a weekday in summer,

and the family are at the hospital in London,

when they receive a distressing phone call

from a Chinese restaurant in Dover.

Someone has stolen one of Kelly's collection tins from their counter.

Who would do that to us?

We took it immediately really personally.

It's a stab to my heart.

I was shocked somebody would stoop so low as to want to steal

a sick girl's charity tin.

The restaurant has a CCTV camera,

but the footage isn't clear enough to identify the thief.

The family travel back to Dover, and over the next few days,

they find out another five collection tins have been stolen.

What's going on? It just got worse and worse.

But, we've got to get the funds, whatever.

And that galvanised us into buying

more tins and preparing them and getting them out.

Martin continues his daily routine of going around town

collecting donations from tins.

But when he goes to Silvio's restaurant, no tin can be found.

The thief has struck again.

Uh, we just stumbled upon one more that's gone.

We were distraught cos I thought, "How stupid are we?"

We've had tins, charity boxes,

all sorts on the counters for all the years I've been here.

Never, never, ever been one time they've been stolen.

But Silvio, he's absolutely brilliant there,

and he went, "We'll check the CCTV."

Silvio's CCTV system records high-quality pictures.

Before it disappeared,

the collection tin can be seen on the counter here.

Silvio searches through the footage to find the moment it was taken.

We were just scanning through the days - see the tin, see the tin...

Suddenly, tin wasn't there.

So, then we knew, OK, it's this day.

We went down through the hours,

and I think it was proximately just before midday.

At that time, the tin is in its normal position.

But not for long.

Because of this man.

A camera records him walking into the restaurant and going to the

gent's toilet, taking the tin with him.

Another camera angle shows the man grabbing the tin,

only a split-second before a member of staff walks out

to serve a customer.

The thief leaves a few minutes later with it hidden in his bag.

Silvio believes it contained up to £80 of donations.

Everyone felt gutted, I think.

Gutted that something like that could happen.

But thanks to the CCTV, they do now have an image of the thief.

When I saw how clear it was,

I had no other thought but to get

some stills of this person on my mobile, get it on social media,

and basically, I said, "If anybody knows this person,

"please phone the police on 101."

The police soon start receiving calls from locals

giving the name of the thief.

I got a great deal of reaction from the wonderful Dover folk.

The police investigate the theft of charity tins from other shops, and

they discover that it isn't just this man who's stealing them.

This CCTV footage shows another man walking into a Post Office.

Ignoring an elderly customer who has her back to him,

the man walks straight to Kelly's donation tin...

..uses scissors to snip the string that secures it to the counter,

then walks out with it.

But these pictures are to put an end to the series of heartless thefts

committed by these two men,

which was so upsetting for Kelly's family.

Police recognise them from the videos,

find both men, and arrest them.

We got the phone call from the police to say that the first person

had been caught and the second person had been caught,

and you're thinking, "Yes!"

You know, bang to rights, really.

In court, the 24-year-old man who stole from Silvio's was sentenced to

two years in prison for that and other crimes.

The other thief, who's 33,

was sentenced to four months in prison for numerous crimes.

After the men were arrested, no more collection tins went missing,

and the family were able to continue raising money with the help and

generosity of the people of Dover and beyond.

For the bad apples that are out there,

there are so many more lovely people out there.

It's really heart-warming.

Sadly, since our filming, Kelly's condition deteriorated.

Despite all the efforts of the doctors and after her long,

personal battle, she passed away.

Linda and Martin have now used the funds they raised to set up a

foundation in Kelly's name to help find a cure for the terrible disease

that took their young daughter's life.