Shocking footage shows a thief crawling along the floor of an antiques store before stealing thousands of pounds worth of jewelry during a heist.
The thief was captured on CCTV clambering on his hands and knees after he broke through a skylight and drilled a hole in a door in order to access the shop.
After disabling the cameras, he then pocketed thousands of pounds worth of gold and silver jewelry before making his escape from Notions Antiques, in Grantham, Lincolnshire.
Devastated shop owners believe the professional thief scouted out the premises prior to the crime, which took place at 7pm on October 11.
Director Lewis Checkley, 62, said: ‘They have come through a skylight. They dismantled the sky light, dropped through the middle into the hallway.
‘He made a human size hole in the door with a power tool. It was a very professional job. You can see from the CCTV how professional a job it is.
‘Obviously he has been planning it for some time after sussing out what we had got.
‘They must’ve done a recce of the place to see what system we’ve got and how to do the crime.
‘We don’t have footage of them taking stock because he went behind the counter to switch off the cameras then did what they wanted to do.
‘But we have got him coming into the building, dropping into the hallway, coming through a hole in the door, crawling across the middle of the shop, but that is all.
‘I’m absolutely gutted. The shop has been in business for over 37 years and we’ve never had anything like this happen to us before.
‘You could say it’s even more callous at a time like this. People think they can do what they want and get away with it.
‘There has been that much taken in gold and silver it will take a while to sort out what stock has gone missing because they took the tags off the items.
‘It is going to take a few weeks to figure out exactly what has gone missing.’