A gang of Italian thieves have been jailed for a series of high-end raids, including a £26 million burglary which took place at the Kensington mansion of socialite Tamara Ecclestone.
Jugoslav Jovanovic, Alessandro Maltese and Alessandro Donati admitted to burgling the London mansion in December 2019 – the place where Tamara, 37, calls home with her art gallery owner husband, Jay Rutland, 38.
The trio were behind three raids in West London over 13 days in December 2019.
Other celebrity and socialite victims of the high-end burglaries include former Chelsea FC midfielder and manager Frank Lampard, 43, and his 42-year-old television presenter wife Christine, and the late Leicester City FC owner Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha.
Mother-of-two Tamara – who is the daughter of ex-Formula 1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone – was away on holiday in Lapland with her husband and daughter when their mansion in Palace Green, Kensington was raided.
Hundreds of items of Tamara and Jay’s jewellery, cash, diamonds and precious stones worth £25 million were stolen from the luxurious property.
The planned raid is believed to have been the country’s biggest ever domestic burglary.
Metropolitan Police said the gang are believed to have carried out similar crimes against high-profile victims across Europe ,and had planned to commit further raids on the rich and famous in the UK.
Trio Jovanovic, Maltese and Donati were extradited from Italy and pleaded guilty to conspiracy to burgle between November 29 and December 18, 2019 over the three raids.
Jovanovic also admitted conspiracy to commit money laundering between December 10, 2019 and January 31, last year, and one count of attempting to convert criminal property.
Today, he was jailed for 11 years by Judge Martin Edmunds QC at Isleworth Crown Court.
Meanwhile, Maltese and Donati were each sentenced to eight years and nine months in prison.
The men will return to Italy to serve their sentences following the crime proceedings in the UK.
During the court case, the judge told them: “In November and December 2019, each of you flew into this country to take your parts in targeting the west London homes of well-known and wealthy people.
“The fact that each burglary was accomplished despite the precautions of the householders, that so much was stolen and then, it is to be inferred, removed from the country and not recovered speaks to the overall organisation, planning and criminal determination, together with a willingness to take chances.
“You did so in the hope of substantial gain for yourselves but regardless of the loss to those people – not only of objects of financial value but of objects of deep personal significance and of the sense of safety and security that anyone is entitled to feel in their own home.”
The judge said the gang had chosen their targets because of the 'celebrity of their occupiers’.
He went on: “The distress caused by the burglary of a home of householders who may be well-known or wealthy is no less than that caused to those in different circumstances.
“The acute distress caused to children, or the fear for the safety of children, is a particular feature.
“There have been life-changing effects on the victim’s own sense of safety.”
Only a handful of items have been recovered with the rest of the £26 million worth of loot believed to have been taken abroad.
