A thief who stole £100,000 of jewels from Jose Mourinho’s London hotel room was found living in a cupboard.
Jamie Filan became known around the world back in 2013 after breaking into the Portuguese football manager’s room while he was staying at the Wyndham Grand Hotel in Chelsea.
Filan, 40, had just been released from prison again when he moved into the Grand Hotel in Torquay, Devon, in October 2019, reports Devon Live.
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After finding he had nowhere to live upon his release, he broke into storerooms at the four-star seafront hotel, using a linen cupboard as an en-suite bathroom.
Staff at the hotel were shocked find the home he’d built for himself, and when he realised he’d been caught out, he fled.
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He managed to stay at the hotel unnoticed for several days before escaping.
The £155-per-night rooms are three storeys above the suite where Agatha Christie spent her honeymoon with her first husband in 1914 but it did not need much detective work to identify Filan.
He appeared to leave the hotel in such a hurry that he forgot his prison documents, clothes and sleeping back, which he left on the floor.
Filan broke into a house just 200 metres away after leaving the hotel, stealing jewellery and a bank card which he used to buy new clothes, food, and a First Class train ticket to Bristol.
He was recalled to prison a couple of weeks later but the case has taken two years to get to court because the police did not realise he was back inside and sent his court summons to his last known address.
Filan, now of Portsmouth, admitted burglary, criminal damage and fraud and was jailed for 15 months by Judge Timothy Rose at Exeter Crown Court.
He told him: “You have a long history of breaking into people’s homes and must know that it can be very disturbing and affect the rest of their lives. Some people never feel safe in their homes again.”
Mr Tom Bradnock, prosecuting, said staff at the hotel realised an intruder had set up home on the fifth floor on the morning of October 7, 2019.
He said: ”They discovered someone had gone into two store rooms and begun living unlawfully. There was evidence that one room had been used as a toilet and bedding was soiled.
“A second room had been slept in and access had been gained by one of the doors being forced open. The combined damage to the door and bedding was £90.
“It was clear that whoever had been there had left in a hurry. Belongings had been left behind. There was a sleeping bag, clothing and a rucksack in which details including his prison identity card was found.”
Mr Bradnock said Filan carried out the burglary in neighbouring Rousdown Road shortly after fleeing the hotel. He stole a jewellery box full of family heirlooms from a woman who had only bought her first home days earlier.
She found the box and her paste jewellery dumped nearby and Filan sold the rest at a second-hand shop for £580. Most of it was recovered.
He used the bank card to go on a £609 spending spree which the victim’s bank refused to indemnify, meaning she was out of pocket and struggled to make her first mortgage repayment.
Filan represented himself and persuaded the judge it would be unfair to impose the mandatory three year term for a three strike burglar because he had already served 16 months on recall.
He said he had written to the police saying he wanted to confess and get the case settled but had not got a reply.
He said he suffered liver failure during his last sentence which has caused him to change his lifestyle and he has settled down with a partner, settled home, and a job.
Filan has an extensive criminal record which dates from 2007 when he was jailed for a hit and run crash in Lancing, Sussex, that killed 30-year-old dental nurse Michelle Dever.
He achieved notoriety for the first time when he filmed himself partying in Ibiza just weeks after being given early release.
He went on to specialise in high value burglaries at top London hotels and was such a menace that he was banned from entering any hotel in the city.
He was jailed again in 2010, 2011, 2013, 2018 and 2019 and had just been released when he moved into the Grand.
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