A third member of a gang which stole cars and vans during a burglary spree they boasted about on social media has been jailed.

George Paton and his accomplices broke into homes across Folkestone, Hythe, Dymchurch, Lydd and Camber in September 2020 and stole car keys, bank cards and nine vehicles worth £68,000.

The 21-year-old, from Bromley, admitted conspiracy to burgle and conspiracy to steal and was yesterday sentenced at Canterbury Crown Court to four years and three months in prison.

His sentence will be served concurrently to a nine-year sentence imposed on him for a robbery in which he threatened a taxi driver with a samurai sword.

Fellow conspirators Jayden Jones-McGilvray and.Harrison Walker were sentenced to three years and 10 months and four years and two months respectively.

The burglaries generally took place overnight and would see the offenders enter a home, steal keys, and drive away with the victim's vehicles.

Stolen registration plates would often be used to try and disguise the criminality.

Footage posted online by the burglary gang

DC Kirsty Gee, from Kent Police's Chief Constable’s crime squad, said: "Paton is a habitual thief who thinks nothing of breaking into people’s homes and stealing property.

"Many of the victims of this case were reliant upon their vehicles for work and that understandably caused an extra layer of stress to the insecurity they would have already felt from having a stranger enter their home.

"We will never show any tolerance for this offending and will always pursue every reasonable line of inquiry to ensure criminals like Paton are brought to justice.

"I am pleased he has now been removed from the streets and is unable to harm other innocent people. Kent is undoubtedly safer with him behind bars."

The gang travelled to the Pontins Camber Sands holiday camp, where they stayed during the crime wave.

They were later caught after police found suspicious Snapchat footage. The trio filmed themselves joyriding - with the caption “working.”

Footage showed Jones-McGilvray, who lives in Richmond, west London, racing down a busy road on a stolen motorbike and waving at Paton and Walker who pass him in a van while filming.

Canterbury Crown Court heard numerous car owners woke to find windows and doors open, their homes strewn in mud and vehicles missing.

Gordon Ross, mitigating, said Paton has been working to change his ways since being kept on remand.

He suffered a traumatic childhood and had been diagnosed with autism and ADHD, he explained.

“There does appear to be hope and motivation, a determination, for this defendant who has expressed to me not to return to a criminal lifestyle,” he said.