A bungling crook has been jailed for more than three years after he was caught on camera loitering outside a house he had broken into – with cops then finding a pair of DNA laden gloves the criminal had dropped inside the property.
Simon Winks then went on to carry out another housebreaking weeks later – only to get caught on camera again trying to use stolen bank cards at a nearby cash machine shortly after the theft.
Winks first smashed his way into a house in Dundee while the occupiers were on holiday.
Passers by later saw the back door sitting open and contacted the householders, who in turn had a relative go to check on the house.
They found it had been ransacked – and while the relative waited on police arriving spotted Winks standing nearby looking suspicious and snapped a photo of him on their phone.
Forensic examiners then found a pair of gloves that Winks had dropped on the floor during the raid – with DNA found within linking him inextricably to the crime.
The callous crook had taken the homeowners’ wedding and engagement rings – said to be of “significant sentimental value” – which have never been found.
Dundee Sheriff Court was told that around three weeks later Winks targeted a flat in Dundee’s Kerrsview Terrace, breaking in while the couple and two children who lived there slept.
Fiscal depute Charmaine Gilmartin told the court that in the morning the man living there couldn’t find his bank card – and when his partner went to look for hers found hers also missing.
She said: “He was later seen on CCTV around 6.30am that day attempting to use the two bank cards before depositing them in a waste bin.”
Winks, 41, a prisoner at HMP Perth, pleaded guilty on indictment to charges of theft by housebreaking committed between April 11 and April 16 and a second carried out on May 6.
Defence solicitor Anne Duffy said: “He understands a significant period of custody will follow these offences.
“In March he had gone to a friend’s house and found him unconscious on the floor.
“Paramedics arrived and pronounced him dead.
“That incident caused him significant distress and as a consequence of that he began abusing street valium.”
Sheriff Alastair Brown jailed Winks for three years and four months – reduced from five years for his early guilty plea.
He said: “These were serious and despicable crimes.”
