Four prolific London phone thieves have been jailed for handling more than 5,000 stolen phones – with two convicted of spending thousands of pounds from their victims’ bank accounts.
Over an 18-month period the group handled phones that had been stolen from across the capital and two of the men made purchases or took out loans using the devices.
The cost of their crimes totalled a staggering £5.1million, said the Met police.
Officers believe many of the phones were then sold abroad.
Some victims had thousands of pounds transferred out of their bank accounts, while others had payments come out for designer clothes worth hundreds.
The group of men were tracked down by local officers from Lambeth and Southwark after theft and robbery multiple victims reported they had tracked their stolen phones to two London flat blocks.
After surveying the flats to identify the suspects, officers carried out raids in the early hours of February 26.
They found 170 phones believed to have been stolen, but they calculate thousands of people fell victim to the group.
On Thursday, four men – Zakaria Senadjki, 31, Nazih Cheraitia, 34, Ahmed Abdelhakim Belhanafi, 25, and Riyadh Mamouni, also 25 – were sentenced for the crimes.
Senadjki, 31, of Dartmouth Close, Notting Hill was convicted of conspiracy to receive stolen goods, conspiracy to commit fraud by false representation and possessing/controlling ID with improper intention. He was sentenced to eight years in prison.
Abdelhakim Belhanafi, who lived in the same street, was convicted of conspiracy to receive stolen goods and conspiracy to commit fraud by false representation, and was sentenced to four years and eight months.
Mamouni, also of the same address, was convicted of conspiracy to receive stolen goods and sentenced to two years and eight months.
Cheraitia, of Wales Farm Road in Acton, was convicted of conspiracy to receive stolen goods and possess/control ID document with improper intention. He was sentenced to three years and five months.
Commander Owain Richards, from the Metropolitan Police, said: “I want to commend the borough based local officers involved for their excellent work in tracking down these individuals and ensuring they were brought to justice.
“We do not underestimate the impact these crimes have on Londoners and are doing all we can to tackle phone thefts. This includes increased policing in hotspot areas and making better use of technology.
“However we need the phone companies to play their part and make it more difficult for criminals to re-sell these stolen devices. The Met will be speaking with them in the coming weeks to push this issue even further.”
Officers have not been able to track down the owners of all the phones seized as not all were reported as stolen.
The Met has urged anyone who has had a lost or stolen phone to use the national mobile phone register so recovered phones can be restored.
Last year, more than 64,000 mobile phones were reported to the police as stolen in London, through theft or robbery – double the previous two years.
“Phone users should take simple steps to further protect themselves from fraud, by ensuring they have a strong password, two-factor authentication and turn off message previews so thieves cannot see any messages about reset or log in codes when phones are locked and ensuring they have written down and safely stored their IMEI number,” said a Met spokesperson.
