A thief has been sent back to prison after once again committing a crime.
Footage showed Reece Wheat with a can of Red Bull in his hand as he strolled into a Mapperley shop before stealing from it.
He was rumbled a few minutes later though, with neighbourhood officers catching him red-handed just down the street from the Sainsbury’s Local.
Wheat admitted “I’ve nicked some crisps, that’s it”, when he was stopped at the side of Plains Road by the Gedling neighbourhood policing team.
The snacks had been eaten by the time officers caught up with Wheat – around 10.45pm on 24 July – although two bags for life were located nearby.
These were duly searched and found to contain around £200 worth of stock that had also just been stolen – this time from a bakery based down the road, in Breck Hill Road, Mapperley.
Wheat was recently released from prison, having served part of a sentence for multiple commercial burglaries and thefts from last year.
The 29-year-old was forensically linked to two of those break-ins by DNA discovered on discarded cans of Red Bull he was seen drinking from while committing both burglaries.
Having been caught for his latest bout of offending last week, Wheat was presented with in-store footage of him once again carrying his favourite energy drink while committing a crime.
He was also pictured minutes later carrying a bag full of stolen stock from the bakery in one hand and the Red Bull and crisps in the other.
Based on the weight of evidence against him, he pleaded guilty to charges of shop theft and handling stolen goods when he attended Nottingham Magistrates’ Court on Monday (27 July).
Wheat, of Borlace Street, Leicester, was subsequently jailed for eight weeks that same day.
Inspector Steve King, of Nottinghamshire Police, said:
“Our Gedling neighbourhood policing team officers did a great job attending this incident and detaining Reece Wheat as quickly as they did.
“That rapid response led to an admission on the spot from Wheat that he’d just shoplifted, while our officers were also able to recover hundreds of pounds worth of stolen stock from another shop too.
“We’re committed as a neighbourhood policing team to doing everything in our powers to protect our local businesses from thieves, so will always treat any report of this nature with the seriousness it deserves and look to take immediate action.
“This case was a great example of this, with the officers involved working together to catch a prolific thief red-handed and return him to prison.”
