An antiques dealer is accused of using minions to burgle auction houses of collectors’ items.
Darryl Aldridge sold the pieces through eBay after the raids in 2011 and 2012, Brighton Crown Court was told yesterday.
He is also accused of spotting antiques at people’s homes when collecting items he had bought from them on eBay, and going back to burgle the homes himself.
Aldridge, 47, formerly of High Street, Upper Beeding, denied being responsible for 11 burglaries in Lewes, Washington, Warnham, Brighton, Lancing, Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire and Kent.
In one raid at Gorringe’s in High Street, Lewes, walking sticks worth £77,000 were stolen.
Michael Warren, prosecuting, said: “He would see what was coming up at auctions in various auction houses, and effectively if it was good enough he would ask or get people to go and burgle the premises.”
Mr Warren said Aldridge’s computer showed he had searched the internet for auctions, for details of the items on sale, for images of the auction houses and for routes from Brighton to the scenes of the crimes.
Anthony Townsend, 50, of Upper Lewes Road, Brighton, denies one burglary at Stroud Auctions in Stroud, Gloucestershire.
Mobile evidence
Mr Warren said mobile phone mast evidence showed Townsend’s phone travelled from Brighton to Stroud and back around the time of the raid on October 11, 2011, and that it exchanged calls with a phone belonging to Aldridge.
He said a 1798 Klotz violin stolen from Stroud was found at Aldridge’s home, its date marking obscured.
At the Gorringe’s auction house in Lewes, on May 7, 2011, Aldridge is accused of taking antiques including a Goldscheider and Czech art deco wall mask and bust – police found the wall mask at Aldridge’s home.
Mr Warren said staff from Gorringes identified the mask, offered for sale on eBay on the account of Lee Smith, a business partner of Aldridge.
Three convicted
At Toovey’s auction house in Washington, near Storrington, on May 16, 2011, he is accused of taking pieces including a George III mahogany wine ‘cellaret’ and coopered bucket.
Three men have already been convicted of carrying out some of the raids. In February last year Ashley Symes, then 45, was jailed for four years for offences including the Gorringes walking stick raid.
Alan Topping, then 49, of Holland Road, Hove, was jailed last year for 26 months for burglaries at Cranbrook, Kent, and JS Auctions in Banbury, Oxfordshire.
Luke Hammond, then 21, of Foredown Road, Portslade, got a community order for the Banbury raid.
The trial continues.
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