A jeweller has told of his devastation after his Wembley shop was smashed to pieces by brazen thieves during an early morning raid.
Footage shows a gang of men ramming a black Range Rover into the Kenya Jewellers store on Ealing Road about 3.30am on Sunday before ransacking the shop and taking jewellery worth thousands of pounds.
During the clip, posted widely on social media, the group of men are seen piling jewellery into large buckets before fleeing the scene in an Audi.
Ajit Kumar, the owner of Kenya Jewellers, said he had been alerted to the raid by the shop’s alarm system and rushed to the scene with his brother and co-owner Kulmesh Kumar. Police had already arrived and established a crime scene.
He told the Standard: “It was like a demolition site. The Range Rover had completely smashed the front door, there was glass everywhere and the counters had been broken.
“I couldn’t believe it, I was literally shattered. I thought: how could this happen? Even on Monday morning I started to have nightmares about it.”
Mr Kumar estimates the thieves stole around 80 per cent of the goods from his shop, and said it would take at least two months to reopen the store. The family business, set up by his father in 1980, sells high quality gold and diamond jewellery with the average price of a single item beginning at £1,500.
He added: “The only other time we have been burgled was in 1992 when there was an arms hold up and three men came in holding shotguns. There have only been small incidents since.
“Thankfully the police arrived in about five minutes as there is a station just around the corner. It was very efficient.”
Mr Kumar, 68, said that the local community in Wembley had rallied around him to help since the incident. “My phone is ringing non-stop,” he added.
A spokesperson for the Metropolitan Police said: “Police were called on Sunday 14 November at approximately 03:30 to reports of a robbery in progress at a commercial address in Wembley, HA0.
“Police attended the scene within minutes and found a vehicle which appeared to have rammed in to the building and been abandoned at the scene.
“No arrests have been made at this early stage, and enquiries in to the circumstances of the incident are ongoing.”
