Jailed: The car key burglars who targeted high-performance vehicles worth £1.5m

They were responsible for at least 44 burglaries, an attempted burglary and thefts of vehicles across the West Midlands and Staffordshire.

The racket was smashed by a joint police operation involving officers from two forces. Thirteen of the crooks have now been locked up for a total of 68 years and nine months.

The two-and-a-half-year long investigation, called Operation Teaser and involving officers from West Midlands and Staffordshire police forces, led to the arrest of 30 suspects, 19 of whom were charged.

Judge Martin Walsh said at the conclusion of a case that could not be reported until today: "It is no exaggeration to say that over that period of the conspiracy the West Midlands and parts of Staffordshire were subjected to a campaign of burglary of such nature and extent that every residential address in those areas was considered a potential target.

"This was organised crime on a significant scale involving the systematic theft of high-valumotor vehicles."

The gang's leaders – 28-year-old Martin Steadman and Darren Percival, 37, who have each been sent to prison for 11 years – toured the area identifying houses with expensive cars to steal and ship abroad. Then the pair recruited teams of burglars to break into the properties, take the ignition keys and drive away in the selected vehicles.

The cars were stolen between May and December 2010. Some of the cars were then passed to middle men and prepared for smuggling out of the country in shipping containers.

No car was safe from crooks

It was stealing on an industrial scale – and no home or driveway in the Black Country or South Staffordshire was safe.

High-performance cars were taken almost nightly as more than £1.2million worth of high performance saloons and 4x4s were targeted to be shipped to the Middle East and Africa or cut up into spare parts.

Some were systematically stolen to order from drives or garages in car key burglaries by a gang of Wolverhampton crooks.

Others were used as getaway cars during the seven-month crime spree before being dumped.

The rest were passed to two teams of handlers working out of Birmingham and Smethwick who delivered the vehicles to a team of African men responsible for arranging shipment overseas, sometimes after the vehicle had been cut up for spares.

One car was later found in a container and was about to be shipped out of the country with a batch of nine other vehicles stolen from different parts of England and Scotland.

Nobody was injured during the raids but one police officer had to leap for his life as a stolen Audi sped away after being stolen from an address in Coven, South Staffordshire.

And their actions brought fear and misery to scores of victims, who lost their possessions but also had their privacy violated.

One Black Country couple who were packing their soldier daughter off to Afghanistan when they were raided by the gang.

Their van was stolen and a haul of jewellery with immense sentimental value also taken when the gang realised they were away and returned to the break into house again the following night.

Rosalind Dacre, 57, from Fallings Park admitted today: "I felt they had taken my life away. All my memories were gone."

Her husband Michael, 60, developed serious illness blamed on the stress of raid.

The mother of two explained: "We had gone to London to help clear out the flat of our daughter Bonita who was with the Royal Logistics Corps and was preparing to go to Afghanistan where she served alongside the Marines.

"Two days after we left they broke in through the patio door, stole the keys to Michael's transit van and drove it away - but that was not enough for them.

They returned the next night and ransacked the place, stealing lap tops, mobile phones, Christmas presents and jewellery.

"The jewellery was the worst. So much of it was of sentimental value. It was priceless to me and is irreplaceable.

"We lost a baby at 14 weeks and only had a couple of pictures of the child.

"I kept one in a locket that they took. That devastated me.

"They stole the cross and chain my daughter always took with her for good luck when on operational tours. The specially-designed ruby ring and pendant we had given her for her 18th and 21st birthdays also went along with items of jewellery passed down to me by my grandmother, a pendant with a photo of my mother aged 17 and the first piece of jewellery given to me by my husband. We have been married 40 years and that still meant the world to me.

"It made me ill and my husband had an angina attack. Since then he has been diagnosed with Crohn's disease. The doctors said that stress brought on by the burglary could have contributed to it. We do not feel safe in our own home any more. My daughter was preparing to go to Helmand to fight for her country while these scum were taking our possessions. It was very hard to accept this."

The gang pocketed between £700 and £1,000 a time, stealing motors to order worth up to £70,000 each. But none of the thieves seemed to enjoy the high life. Most of the money they made was squandered on short-term highs like cocaine.

One officer involved in the case confirmed: "None got anything significant from their life of crime. What money they made was blown on booze and drugs."

Gang leaders Martin Steadman, aged 28, and 37-year-old father of one Darren Percival – both career crooks – toured the area looking for luxury cars to steal before calling in teams of hired men to burgle the selected address and steal the ignition key and chosen vehicle. The haul was mainly made up of BMWs and Audis along with other top of the range brands such as Jaguar, Subaru Impreza and Mitsubishi. Police officers from West Midlands and Staffordshire forces joined together to set up a specialist squad dedicated to smashing the racket as the crime wave threatened to swamp the area.

Operation Teaser was launched in September 2010 and its inquiries led to 30 suspects being arrested in various dawn raids over the next year, although not all of these were prosecuted.

The swoops came as a jigsaw of CCTV, forensic and other evidence was painstakingly pieced together by the five-strong team of officers and a dedicated analyst.

This produced a complicated matrix of information linking the suspects to 48 offences made up of 44 burglaries and attempted burglaries and four thefts of motor vehicles. Their first major breakthrough came within weeks of the start of the inquiry when Steadman and Percival were stopped and checked after being seen driving a red Skoda Octavia in Birches Road, Codsall, at around 3.30am on September 22 2010.

Minutes afterwards came reports of a £28,000 Impreza being stolen in a car key burglary from a nearby house.

The tracker device on the vehicle later indicated that it was in Fareham Crescent, Merry Hill. Twenty minutes later the Octavia was also seen in the same road.

It was stopped again and on this occasion Steadman and Percival were arrested before being freed on bail after questioning. The pair had already been identified as suspects in the racket and this strengthened the link.

Steadman had been given a suspended prison sentence after being convicted of conspiracy to steal cars in April 2010, days before the start of the latest spate of vehicle thefts.

Percival had a previous conviction for handling cars that had been stolen to order. They lived around the corner from each other in Low Hill, Wolverhampton.

The distinctive red Octavia was linked to several of the car key burglaries and suspicions were confirmed when traces of Steadman's blood were discovered in a £20,000 BMW 3301 M Sport with personalised registration number stolen from an address in Cranmere Avenue, Tettenhall in the early hours of June 26, 2010.

It was found almost a month later on July 20 with false plates in an industrial estate in Barking where it was waiting to be transported to South Africa.

The tell tale spot of blood was on the central console in the rear of the vehicle. When forensic checks discovered it came from Steadman police had a concrete link between their prime suspect and the gang of car key burglars blighting the region.

Painstaking inquiries by the Operation Teaser team gradually connected him and Percival with the web of thieves recruited by the duo to do their dirty work and take the risk of being arrested carrying out the car key burglaries.

One of their lieutenants was Craig Mason, a 39-year-old bachelor living at Lathe Court in Pickering Road, Wednesfield, who was an experienced criminal with links to the handlers in Birmingham and Smethwick who passed the stolen cars up the chain for shipment abroad.

He was jailed for nine years while Steadman and Percival each received 11 years.

Judge Martin Walsh, said when sentencing the trio and other members of the gang following an earlier trial: "This was organised crime on a significant scale involving the systematic theft of high value motor vehicles

"The principal movers were Steadman, Percival and, to a lesser extent, Mason.

"But those who were not the guiding hands or minds of the organisation each played a significant part by burgling and stealing.

"They were recruited for that purpose and without their assistance the conspiracy would not have been so wide ranging.

"I full accept that there must have been other people involved in the conspiracy and it is not unreasonable to assume that the part they played included involvement in the chain of distribution."

DCI Shaun Edwards from the gangs and organised crime unit at West Midland Police said: "There is certainly a market out there for these kind of vehicles.

"We have found that cars have ended up in the Caribbean and parts of Africa. It is a national thing that is reflected in the West Midlands.

"Some of the vehicles end up with false number plates and are then sold in this country using fraudulent documents.

"But there are vehicles that are shipped out of this country – as has been proved by the discovery of stolen cars in containers ready for shipment."

Det Con Damon Millar, another of the squad, commented: "This two and a half year investigation has taken a generation of car key burglars out of the picture, this will hopefully give the community and victims reassurance and closure.

"In addition the robust sentencing of 62 years and counting should send out a firm message to all local criminals."