Amazon thief who stole designer watches jailed after 8 years

An Amazon warehouse worker who orchestrated an elaborate theft operation targeting designer sports watches has been sentenced to 12 months in prison – despite being on the run for more than eight years.

Edvin Groza, 49, exploited his position at the Amazon warehouse off Fabian Way in Swansea to steal thousands of pounds worth of high-value items. The Hungarian national used his access to the company’s database to identify where expensive watches were stored before removing them from shelves without scanning them into the stock system.

His scheme unravelled in October 2016 when a loss prevention officer reviewing CCTV footage spotted him taking items and replacing empty boxes on the shelves. When confronted at the end of his shift on 3 November, three Fitbit watches were discovered in his locker – with instruction manuals hidden inside his shoes.

A subsequent search of his Townhill home on Roderick Close uncovered a staggering haul: 38 Fitbit sports watches, nine Polar sports watches, three Garmin sports watches, mobile phones, Oakley sunglasses, along with £8,900 in cash, 2,000 Euros, and 350,000 Hungarian Forint.

Groza claimed he’d bought the watches at a car boot sale in Swansea’s High Street car park and planned to give them to friends – a story prosecutors dismissed as “fanciful”. He insisted the cash came from family money and rental properties in Hungary.

The court heard Groza had worked at Amazon for three-and-a-half years before his arrest. After pleading guilty to two counts of theft in September 2017, he was granted bail – but never returned for sentencing. Police intelligence suggests his wife and children returned to Hungary following his guilty pleas, with authorities believing he followed them.

At Swansea Crown Court, Judge Paul Thomas KC said the former warehouse employee had been involved in a “planned criminal enterprise” involving a significant breach of trust placed in him by his employer.

Passing sentence in Groza’s absence, the judge noted that “in the highly unlikely event” the defendant returns to the UK, he will be required to serve his sentence.

The stolen items recovered from his home were returned to Amazon but had to be destroyed as they could no longer be sold. Surprisingly, the court also heard the seized cash had been destroyed in the years since – prompting the judge to allow prosecutors 14 days to apply for a confiscation order should that information prove incorrect.

Groza has no previous convictions in the UK.