Three men who carried out a string of burglaries across Stockport have been jailed for a total of 34 years.
Owen Edwards, 21, Michael Goddard, 32, and Kyle Warburton, 24, spent two days targeting homes in Marple, Mellor and Offerton in December 2021.
During one incident, in the early hours of December 29, the rear patio door window of one home in Marple was smashed using a sundial from the garden. The car keys and house keys were taken from the kitchen table.
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The homeowners told police they heard a noise and saw their BMW being driven away. Within 48 hours of it being stolen, it was involved in a high-speed police chase from Cheshire to Stockport, which ended with all three men being arrested.
During another incident on December 30, the front door window of a home in Offerton was smashed. The owner told police he heard a noise and when he checked his security camera footage, he saw three men clad in dark clothing near his car.
One man was holding a large machete and another threw a brick repeatedly against the front door. They left empty-handed, having arrived and left the scene in the stolen BMW.
At around 9.30pm on December 30, a downstairs window was smashed at a home in Mellow. The resident, who was at home with his teenager daughter at the time, discovered four men dressed in dark clothing in his living room.
He punched one of them while another man waved a machete at him. They followed him through the house while demanding the keys to his VW Golf before they all jumped back out of the broken window and sped off in the stolen car.
In the early hours of December 31, Cheshire police spotted the stolen BMW in Handforth, Cheshire, as it sped away from them.
A pursuit saw the BMW reach speeds of up to 120mph as it was tracked by a police helicopter. The car was eventually abandoned on Cale Street in Stockport and Owen Edwards, Michael Goddard and Kyle Warburton fled from the car. They were later arrested following a short foot chase.
Carl Miles, for CPS North West, said: “These three men carried out a terrifying armed burglary and two of them other serious burglaries over two days. The fact that homeowners were present was no deterrent to them; they had no regard for the distress their actions would cause in their pursuit of greed.
“One man who was home with his teenage daughters when he was threatened with a machete and chased through the house said in his victim impact statement how he was shocked, stunned, terrified, petrified and traumatised at the lengths anyone would go to for a car.
“Everyone deserves to feel safe and secure in their own homes. The sentences passed today mean that three very dangerous men are off the streets.”
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