Burglar jailed for breaking into Harrogate homes while owners slept

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Daniel Prague, 19, broke in through a front window at both properties in Nydd Vale Terrace, Harrogate, before rifling through sideboards and cupboards and stealing an array of items including bank cards, medication and a commemorative coin.

One of the victims was a pharmacist who had medication stolen from her home in the dead of night, York Crown Court heard.

Prosecutor Helen Towers said Prague was on bail at the time, having been arrested on suspicion of a previous alleged burglary in November last year and was supposed to be observing a doorstep curfew.

On December 3, a husband and wife at one of the Nydd Vale properties woke to find their home had been burgled and items including a Hug Boss wallet and leather handbag containing banks cards, driving licences and £50 cash had been stolen. A commemorative coin of sentimental value was also taken and was never recovered.

Ms Towers said the burglar had broken in through an unlocked front window.

The empty handbag and a bank card were later found on the path leading to the second burgled property in the same street.

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The woman who lived at the property, a pharmacist, woke in the early hours of the morning to find her living-room window open. Her Paris Print handbag had been stolen which contained paperwork, perfume and medication.

Prague, who has a track record for burglary, was later identified on video footage from a doorbell security camera at one of the properties. The footage showed a hooded man wearing gloves who was “trying to duck down out of the way (of the camera)”.

He was arrested about two weeks after the burglaries but refused to answer police questions.

Prague, of Avenue Grove, Harrogate, appeared for sentence via video link on Tuesday after pleading guilty to two counts of burglary. A third alleged burglary - for which Prague was on bail when he committed the two substantive offences - was allowed to lie on file.

The court heard he had five previous convictions for offences including burglaries in May and November 2019, when he was sentenced to 13 months in a young-offenders’ institution.

Nicholas Leadbeater, for Prague, said the teenager was homeless at the time of his latest offences due to a “combination of factors” including a cocaine addiction.

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Jailing Prague for two years and four months, judge Simon Hickey said prison was inevitable because the defendant was a “third-strike” burglar.