After a 13-week trial, a gang who conspired to steal millions of pounds’ worth of jewellery before tying up and terrorising victims in their own homes, have been sentenced. Here Legal Affairs Correspondent Rebecca Sherdley looks back on how the case began with a daring heist at at Nottinghamshire art gallery.
Snow fell as raiders in boiler suits and helmets crept through freezing fields by the Harley Gallery, on the ducal estate of Welbeck Abbey, north Nottinghamshire, and smashed their way in. It took just eight minutes for them to get their hands on The Portland Tiara and an associated brooch, with a combined value of approximately £3,750,000.
The gems, stolen on November 20, 2018, have never been recovered. The swift and shocking heist, though, was just the tip of the iceberg. As one Nottinghamshire Police team focused on this crime alone, the investigation began to gather pace, and turned over other incriminating lines of inquiry no one would ever have imagined.
