"Gone in 60 seconds" luxury car heist gang members jailed for up to 6 years

Four members of a multi-million pound gang that stole dozens of luxury vehicles, including socialite Tara Palmer-Tomkinson's BMW, were jailed for up to six years each today.

London's Southwark crown court heard that during their "highly sophisticated" crime spree, the gang toured the capital with a shopping list of top-of-the-range models. Once targets had been identified, keys were later stolen during burglaries, or false documents and names used to obtain copies from overseas dealers.

The cars, worth up to £350,000 each, were then driven away, given new identities by a "master forger", and exported in a scam reminiscent of Nicolas Cage's hit film Gone in 60 Seconds.

Most of the cars ended up in Maastricht and Antwerp in Holland, before being delivered to the United Arab Emirates. A few went to Singapore and South Africa.

The court heard Palmer-Tomkinson's £50,000 BMW 645 convertible was spotted outside her London home and its details recorded on a mobile phone. A forged car logbook and bogus passport were then used to get a "replacement" key from a Stuttgart dealer.

The high-powered vehicle was later found at Birmingham City airport. Some of the socialite's personal possessions - including correspondence and a jeweller's receipt - were subsequently discovered on the coffee table of gang leader Imran Ganchi, 29.

In a statement after the case, Palmer-Tomkinson said police had been "extremely supportive" after the theft of her car and possessions. "They are to be congratulated on their efforts in finding my stolen car and successfully apprehending the gang responsible for stealing it," she said.

The court heard Palmer-Tomkinson's BMW was just one of six recovered of the 34 stolen by the gang during its slick three-and-a-half year crime spree. The others remain with unidentified new owners, most of whom apparently paid "near market value" for them.

They include dozens of Porsches, Mercedes, Range Rovers, Toyota Land Cruisers, and one £350,000 SLR McLaren supercar, which police believe was the first of its type stolen in England.

Passing sentence, Judge Peter Testar said: "The economic damage caused by these offences is very great, notwithstanding or perhaps because of the fact that the people from whom the vehicles are stolen are insured."

He said the criminal operation owed much of its success to the work of a master forger, and told Ganchi that as the ringleader: "You chose the path of rich pickings from dishonesty and chose it very, very soon after having been released from a sentence for something similar. The stakes were high and you knew it," he added.

Apart from the socialite, owners targeted included diplomats, the "head of Al Jazeera television", and a number of unnamed "high profilers".

The court heard the thieves, convinced they were untouchable, videoed themselves at the wheel during their heists. One mobile phone clip showed 21-year-old Yusef Kaduji apparently trying to verify the 208mph McLaren's claimed 3.6 second 0-60 time.

Although the "used value" of the stolen cars was over £1.5 million, the final tally would have approached £2.5 million had the gang remained free to honour its bulging order book.

The mastermind, Ganchi, a father-of-two with addresses in Mellows Road and Rachel Close, Ilford, Essex, was jailed for six years; Kaduji, of Jephson Road, Forest Gate, east London, got two years; forger Hameed Nawaz, 31, of Ivy Road, Luton, Bedforshire received three years; and Shazad Hussain, 31, of Springford Road, Moseley, Birmingham, was given four years. A fifth gang member, Shakeel Shoukat, 21, of Central Park Road, Forest Gate, was given a 12-month sentence suspended for two years, with a tagging and curfew requirement. They variously admitted conspiracies involving car thefts and money laundering between June 1 2003 and January 1 this year.

Hussain also asked for the handling of two stolen Mercedes SL500s and a Toyota Land Cruiser to be considered. Kaduji made a similar request involving an Aston Martin.

Francis Sheridan, prosecuting, told the court the gang's "highly sophisticated" enterprise was stopped after a two-year police investigation called Operation Interspace. The operation was launched after the police were contacted by Dutch counterparts and handed recordings of coded telephone calls between Dutch "criminal" Frans Wolters and Ganchi about shipping stolen cars.

Ganchi's Rachel Close home was later searched and an Aladdin's Cave of evidence recovered - forged logbooks, fake vehicle ID stickers, number plate making machines, hundreds of blank number plates and eight stolen British passports.

Police later found Palmer-Tomkinson's car and one of the stolen Mercedes' parked at Birmingham City Airport with false number plates. Nawaz's home was also raided. Hundreds of "high quality" forged documents were found along with fake logbooks, insurance certificates, invoices and utility bills.

Case officer Detective Constable Ian Slaney said officers were now trying to trace the huge profits made by the gang. He said: "These cars were sold abroad so it is only right the money is also overseas. All the evidence we have shows those involved lived modest lives, clearly to avoid detection." A confiscation hearing will be held later.

Outside court, Detective Inspector Nick Linfoot, head of the Met's stolen vehicle unit, said: "This is not a victimless crime. Apart from the financial loss to the insurance companies and knock-on costs to customers, the victims whose cars were stolen also had their personal belongings taken from inside the cars, undoubtedly increasing the stress, inconvenience and intrusion they felt."

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