Three men have pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit burglary after being caught digging a tunnel from a massage parlour bathroom into a Tooting jewellers, as part of a wider crime spree totalling more than £700,000.
Caught in the Act
Police were called to reports of a suspected burglary on Mitcham Road, Tooting, at 3.12am on Friday, July 17. Officers searched the massage parlour and discovered the group's plan to tunnel through a wall into the neighbouring jewellery shop, along with bags of tools and equipment for the dig.
Ioan Asafeti, 39, and Laurentiu-Daniel Nitisoara, 38, both of no fixed address, and Sergiu Plastin, 42, of Portadown, Co Armagh, Northern Ireland, pleaded guilty at Kingston Crown Court on Friday, August 21, to conspiracy to commit burglary with intent to steal and cause criminal damage.
Arrests and Investigation
At the scene, Nitisoara was arrested in a nearby alleyway, while officers found Asafeti hiding on a rooftop and took him into custody. Plastin was caught later that day as he tried to flee to Ireland via London Stansted, tracked down using mobile phone data linked to a car associated with the group.
The investigation, led by the Met Police's Flying Squad, linked the men to several burglaries across London between May and July. Detectives found they mainly targeted jewellers, using tunnelling techniques to gain access to shops overnight while bypassing security systems. CCTV footage showed the men obtaining tools and equipment used in the offences, and further enquiries through Interpol found possible links to similar offences in Europe.
Impact and Sentencing
Detective Superintendent Dan Mitchell, of the Met Police's Flying Squad, said: “These criminals dug their own hole after emergency response officers caught them red-handed. Their arrests didn’t just stop this burglary. They formed part of a wider Flying Squad investigation that uncovered an organised crime group linked to a string of jewellery shop break-ins across London worth more than £700,000.”
Mitchell added: “We’re driving down commercial burglary across the capital, with offences falling by 12% in the past year. Our message to these criminals is clear: target London businesses and we’ll hunt you down and put you before the courts.”
The three men are scheduled to be sentenced on October 23 at Kingston Crown Court.
