'Brazen' jewellery thief jailed after £16k haul

Eleanor Lawson
BBC News, West Midlands
West Midlands Police A mugshot of a man who stares at the camera with slightly pursed lips. He wears a grey t-shirt and stands in front of a grey background. The top half of the West Midlands Police logo is in the bottom right corner.West Midlands Police
Nick Dosanjh would ask to look at jewellery then run out of the shop, West Midlands Police said

A "brazen" jewellery thief who would ask to see items in jewellery stores then flee the shop with them has been jailed.

Nick Dosanjh was jailed for two years at Wolverhampton Crown Court on 27 June after a series of thefts with a haul totalling more than £16,000.

Dosanjh committed thefts at jewellery stores in the Black Country, Birmingham, and Wolverhampton, but was caught when traffic officers stopped him in Oldbury.

The 33-year-old, of Greenhill Road in Handsworth Wood, had pleaded guilty to nine charges of shop theft.

West Midlands Police said Dosanjh's series of heists began on 18 January, when he asked staff at a jewellers in West Bromwich if he could have a look at a gold chain from a display cabinet.

The staff member handed the chain over to Dosanjh, who then ran from the store.

On the same day, he used similar tactics at a jewellers in Birmingham, again, fleeing with a gold chain.

He then went on to commit similar offences in Sutton Coldfield, Walsall, Solihull, Brierley Hill, Wolverhampton and Smethwick.

However, his spree of thefts came to an end when he was stopped by traffic officers in Oldbury on 19 May after driving a Volkswagen Golf without a license and insurance.

Checks by officers revealed he was also wanted for the string of theft offences.

Sgt Paul Bishop of West Midlands Police said: "Dosanjh was charged with nine shop theft offences with eight of them relating to jewellery shops.

"He was a brazen thief that used the same tactics for each of his offences. However, due to good CCTV footage we were able to link Dosanjh to his crime spree across the West Midlands."

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