A forensic intelligence officer at Cheshire Police explained that every person’s footwear tread pattern is different, which helped lead them to the suspects.
“What makes this one unique is just how rare it was at these specific scenes showing up,” they added.
“It’s almost Scooby-Doo-ish following footwear marks around, but the links are there and you can see it, and that modus operandi bringing it all together is what makes it.”
The men used Google to search affluent postcodes to identify potential targets, according to police, before looking up floor plans on Rightmove.
They would then break in to these properties, stealing money, jewellery, and other valuables, even setting weekly targets of how much gold they wanted to steal.
This was a carefully orchestrated operation, said detectives from Cheshire Police, tasked with investigating the case.
“This isn’t a burglar walking down a street thinking ‘I need to do a burglary’,” Det Ch Insp Dave Worthington said.
He described this level of planning by a criminal gang as “quite shrewd” but they still left clues that would lead to their arrest.