A thief has been jailed for 24 weeks after he was caught raiding a village shop.

Anthony Balcombe, 29, admitted to two counts of burglary when appearing at Chelmsford Magistrates’ Court on Saturday.

Balcombe, of Shires Close, Great Notley, had been charged with burgling Co op stores in Sible Hedingham and Chelmsford last week.

Magistrates ordered him to serve 12 weeks in jail for each offence, and make two separate compensation payments of £200 to the two stores.

Balcombe had been arrested in the early hours of Friday morning after he was caught attempting to steal items from the East of England Co-op store in Swan Street, Sible Hedingham.

Officers were called out to the shop at 1.10am and found Balcombe had used a crowbar to break through the front door of the store.

He was arrested as he attempted to flee the scene while in possession of four bottles of alcohol, 177 boxes of cigarettes and scratch cards worth thousands of pounds.

Police charged him with burglary and was charged with the same offence again when officers linked him to another raid which took place at the Co-Op store in Beehive Lane, Chelmsford on Monday, July 23.

Balcombe is understood to have cut his finger while damaging a shutter during the burglary and he was linked to the incident through DNA left at the scene.

A spokesman for the East of England Co op said the CCTV system at the Sible Hedingham store had played a key role in Balcombe’s arrest.

They said: “Working closely with Essex Police, the offender was arrested at the scene and the stolen items were recovered.

“All our branches are fitted with CCTV and alarm systems are monitored 24/7 by our own in-house security team, which ensures that assistance arrives as quickly as possible.”