A 31-year-old burglar was jailed after repeatedly entering a Tenby home and stealing bottles of beer from the fridge after finding the front door unlocked. 🍺👮
Swansea Crown Court heard that Mark Brook, of Brynheulwen in Blaenannerch, entered a property on Lower Frog Street three times on the morning of April 21 last year after the homeowner left for work at around 6am, leaving his door unlocked while his wife slept upstairs.
The court was told that when the wife went to work, she asked if her husband had left the door unlocked as it was wide open when she came downstairs. Upon returning home, the victim discovered “several bottles of beer” missing from the fridge.
CCTV footage from a neighbour’s business showed Brook walking past the property at 6:20am, returning four minutes later to try a neighbour’s door before entering the victims’ home for about a minute and reappearing with a bottle of beer.
At 6:31am, Brook was seen trying another neighbour’s door handle before re-entering the victims’ home 27 minutes later, exiting whilst trying to open a beer bottle with his teeth. His third entry occurred at 7:33am, when he left holding one bottle with another tucked under his arm.
Prosecutor Regan Walters said the victim reported feeling “terrified”, “violated” and “vulnerable” following the burglary.
Brook, who had 17 previous convictions for 27 offences, pleaded guilty to burglary with intent to steal. The court heard that since his release on bail, he had committed “no lower than 14” further offences.
Defence counsel James Hartson told the court a psychiatric report concluded that Brook was “a very complicated character” whose offending was “motivated in part by his use of illicit substances and alcohol”. Mr Hartson said Brook had “no recollection” of the offence due to “the state he was in” and described his actions as “almost pathetic”.
Judge Paul Thomas KC said the issue wasn’t the financial value of the items stolen but the distress caused to the occupants whose home had been “violated”.
“The sentence I’m about to pass will hopefully give you an opportunity to get clean from those substances,” the judge added before sentencing Brook to 16 months imprisonment.
