A south Essex burglar has been jailed for 30 months over shop break-ins in Thurrock.
Scott Perry, 36, of Alton Drive in South Ockendon, targeted a string of local shops, Southend Crown Court heard.
The thief used his hand to tap the cross sign across his chest several times as he waited to hear his fate.
On May 12, he broke into a Lidl store in South Ockendon by forcing his way through a back door, causing “significant damage”, estimated to have cost £8,000 in repairs.
Once inside, he stole good worth £3,650.
He returned to the same store on June 3 and tried to break in again, but failed.
On July 23, he targeted another store called Ockendon Food and Wine, pulling the rear shutters off the door to force entry.
Police arrived during the incident and arrested him.
He also pleaded guilty to a string of shoplifting offences between November and May, including one in which he was part of a group.
One of the group jumped over the counter and they stole high value items.
After admitting all these offences, he asked for a further five uncharged offences to be taken into account.
Those uncharged offences included forcing entry to a Co Op store with a crowbar.
The court heard Perry committed the offences, stealing items like meat and perfume, to feed a long-term heroin addiction.
But he was now undergoing methadone treatment, had taken a relapse prevention course and was working as a cleaner on his prison wing.
The judge, Recorder Ben Irwin, commended Perry for this, saying he hoped he could “emerge with a clean slate, so you can hopefully get yourself back on track.”
But, he said, this type of offending “obviously blights communities and causes businesses endless difficulty… The message should go out. This is brazen offending. It should be punished appropriately.”
The targeted return to the Lidl store in particular, he said, “has the hallmarks of an offence with a significant degree of planning or organisation: travelling to a specific location that must have been perceived by you to be a soft target.
“There was significant damage caused. It seems to me that the fact that you went back amounts to a particular aggravating feature.”
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