Two men have been jailed following a spate of burglaries that saw air rifles and thousands of pounds taken from Essex homes. 

Danny Middleton, 31, and Kieran Tansey, 22, have been sentenced to a combined jail sentence of nearly five years after they were found guilty of committing several burglaries across three households. 

Middleton was sentenced to three years and two weeks imprisonment after he admitted to three counts of burglary. 

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During one incident he stole five air rifles, ammunition, jewellery and cash, and was captured leaving the property by cameras in the local area. 

In another incident, he stole cash from the wallet of an elderly and disabled man who had left his door unlocked for his carers. 

Middleton and Tansey were found to have acted together on one occasion in September 2022, when they burgled a home in Colchester and stole two watches and thousands of pounds in cash. They were caught on the victim's Ring doorbell and by CCTV in the local area. 

Tansey also breached a restraining order, calling a woman a total of 698 times over the space of 15 days in April 2023. He committed this offence just days after being released from prison. 

Tansey cut off his monitoring tag and went on the run. Officers on the Domestic Abuse Problem Solving Team tracked him across Essex, London, Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire, before he was arrested in May 2023.

Tansey was sentenced to 20 months in prison after he appeared at Ipswich Crown Court on September 22. 

Middleton was sentenced to a jail time of three years and two weeks.