A self-confessed ‘stupid’ phone snatcher got a dose of instant karma after a dramatic police chase led to his arrest.
The thief was one of two spotted by officers travelling at around 60mph on high-speed e-bikes on a busy road in central London.
Armed response cops were called out after receiving reports of phones being snatched – with suggestions the thief may have been carrying a weapon.
Taking off after one of the thieves, officers equipped with Tasers followed him up Exhibition Road in Kensington – a thoroughfare often packed with tourists visiting the Science Museum and the Natural History Museum.
‘We have two Sur-Rons failing to stop as part of a declared firearms incident,’ the officer radios in, seen in dramatic body-worn footage issued by the Met Police.
Sur-Ron is a Chinese firm that produces electric dirt bikes that are hugely popular with bike thieves despite most of its models being illegal to use on UK roads unless properly registered.
The thief leads police on a chase through west London – but a few minutes later, he crashes into the side of a car at a junction after riding through a red light on the wrong side of the road.
The bike falls away from him as he tumbles to the ground, and he tries to run off as the armed cops warn him they’re about to discharge a stun gun.
He doesn’t get far – toppling over as he’s hit with 1,200 volts of electricity. The armed officers then move in to cuff him on suspicion of robbery and possession of an offensive weapon.
Opening his bag, the cops find rolls of tin foil, which thieves will use to wrap up stolen phones in order to block their signals and prevent them from being traced.
‘You could’ve killed us, you could’ve killed a member of the public, and you’re out here robbing people,’ the arresting officer yells at him.
The thug, dressed in sportswear, a black balaclava and a cycling helmet, protests: ‘I’m not robbing people!’
‘Oh, shut up,’ the officer responds. ‘What’s all the tinfoil for then?’
‘To cook,’ the thief claims to the unimpressed policeman. He then moans about his leg being sore after he rode straight into the side of a car.
‘It’s probably in pain because you’ve crashed your bike,’ the police officer replies, to which the thief adds: ‘I know, I’m stupid.’
The dramatic arrest was one of two phone snatcher busts the police made in the space of an hour on March 16.
A second thief was caught after crashing into a postbox on Brook Street in the heart of London’s posh Mayfair district.
Aerial footage captured by a police helicopter shows him stumbling to his feet after the crash, before surrendering as an officer runs into view and tackles him, while two other cops leap out of a response vehicle.
‘He’s just being searched,’ radios in an officer on the ground. ‘We’ve recovered multiple phones on him.’
The Met says it was able to return the stolen phones to their owners.
The thieves, Ellis Parkinson, 31, and Bradley McMillan, 30, were jailed for 33 and 30 months respectively.
Mayor of London Sadiq Khan praised the actions of the officers on social media, warning would-be thieves: ‘We’re working hard to protect Londoners by tackling phone theft head-on.’
But he has been criticised for allowing phone theft to flourish during his nine-year tenure in City Hall.
More than 231,000 mobile phones were stolen in London in the last four years, a threefold increase on the previous four, according to Met Police data.
The majority of thefts were reported in the West End, where 40,000 devices were stolen. And on average, 18 devices a day are stolen on Oxford Street alone.
Police believe the figure could be even greater as not every theft is thought to be reported – with thieves being seen as untouchable and untraceable, an image of invulnerability the Met is trying to shatter.
Earlier this month, former Met Detective Chief Inspector Mick Neville urged the force to do more to fight phone crime after almost falling victim himself earlier this year.
Mr Neville, who managed to hold onto his phone during the incident outside Charing Cross railway station, told The Standard: ‘What are the Met doing?
‘It’s not difficult when you actually know which roads are being targeted. Officers need to be less concerned with the psychology of crime and catch more criminals.
‘These snatchers must be laughing at the law because they know just one per cent of thefts are solved. Each of the 30 streets must have hundreds of CCTV cameras.
‘So the second thing is to actually gather images. See if they are wearing distinctive clothing – even if you can’t see their faces – and link offenders to multiple offences.’
The phone theft epidemic threatens to undermine the capital’s status on the world stage. It is now ranked as Europe’s 15th most dangerous city for crime by Numbeo, a crowd-sourced quality of life index.
Among the most high-profile phone theft victims is Bridgerton star Genevieve Chenneour, who recently revealed she had moved back in with her mother after her phone was grabbed by a teenage thief.
The actress was targeted by 18-year-old Zacariah Boulares at a Joe & The Juice cafe in Kensington in February.
The prolific criminal – who gave the middle finger to the public gallery in court – was jailed for just 22 months on Tuesday despite embarking on a ‘ruthless’ spree of thefts.
He had earlier threatened to behead singer Aled Jones with a 20in machete as he stole his £17,000 Rolex Daytona in Chiswick, west London.
She said: ‘I don’t feel comfortable living in London at the moment. Had this happened two years earlier, when I was just getting my career going, this could have been the end of my career.’
Mr Khan has called on phone makers to make their devices less appealing to thieves by locking them out of essential services such as Google Play and the App Store if they are marked as stolen.
A spokesperson said earlier this month: ‘The Mayor has long been clear we need decisive and coordinated action to halt the burgeoning global trade of stolen phones which is driving criminality and violence across the world.
‘Evidence shows the majority of phones stolen in London are being reconnected in other countries as far as China and Algeria – a large proportion of which are still able to access Play and Apple cloud services to download apps.
‘The Mayor has repeatedly warned it is simply too easy and profitable for criminals to repurpose and sell on stolen phones. This must change.’