Pair spared jail for £25,000 perfume raid at Boots in Portsmouth

Steven Brimecome and Karl Frobisher were spotted loading a green Citroen with large white bags stuffed with perfume in Commercial Road, Portsmouth.

Photos shown to a judge reveal how the pair – who together with a third man burgled the shop on July 20 – ransacked the beauty hall’s cabinets taking perfume.

Prosecutor Christopher Hewertson told how a witness called police at 3.26am saying he saw the men at the shop.

They had forced their way through a rear fire exit door, with a crowbar later found in an aisle in the shop.

When police arrived one officer chased two of the men before one man ran down Craswell Street.

Brimecome was arrested at 3.40am – just 16 minutes after police were called.

Dad-of-two Frobisher was arrested nearby.

Mr Hewertson said: ‘Mr Frobisher asked if he could have the vape from the car, and asked which car he said “the Citroen” and Mr Frobisher told the officer that he was the getaway driver.’

Both Forbisher, 46, of Hempstead Road, Portsmouth, and Brimecome, 31, of Cinderford Close, Paulsgrove, admitted the burglary at an earlier hearing at Portsmouth Crown Court.

Brimecome, who has 27 convictions for 60 offences, was handed a two-year prison sentence suspended for 21 months.

Frobisher, who has 32 convictions for 102 offences, was given a 15-month term suspended for 21 months.

Both men must complete a six-month drug rehabilitation requirement, 20 rehabilitation activity days and pay £150 costs.

When his previous convictions were being listed in court Frobisher claimed he could not remember a burglary in 1999 before the judge said: ‘Maybe you don’t remember.’

The judge added: ‘I suspect I can sentence him for this without worrying about a probation order that may or may not have been given some years ago.’

Claire Jackson, for Brimecome, said they had in effect ‘hung around until the police got there – it wasn’t sophisticated’.

She said dad-of four Brimecome suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder after a cellmate hanged himself and that he had a ‘raging heroin addiction’.

Amy Oliver, acting for Frobisher, said he was off drugs and is ‘committed to abstinence’.