Clothing and bags stolen in burglary which took minutes

CLOTHING and bags worth �20,000 were stolen from a St John’s Wood designer shop on Monday when burglars struck in the early hours of the morning.

The suspects smashed their way into Zadig and Voltaire on St John’s Wood High Street just before 2am, grabbed the goods and made off in a getaway car.

The shop’s manager Fatiha Abdellioua said: “I was called by our security company at about 1.30am saying the alarm was going off so I came down here. There was a lot of glass on the table and all over the floor and the clothes were everywhere.

“Our stuff is quite expensive so the stolen stuff is probably worth about �15,000-�20,000.

“It seems they smashed the glass in the door and came in that way.”

She said the shop had never previously been burgled in the two and a half years it has been located in the High Street although the Hampstead branch has been raided twice.

St John’s Wood High Street resident Pete Harmer’s flat overlooks the shop and he said he was woken by the sound of the alarm.

“At about 1.30am I heard an alarm go off,” he said. “I got up and had a peer out of the window and there were these two guys coming out of the door of the shop. They had handfuls of what looked like clothes.

“They got into a dark coloured car which looked like a BMW. It all lasted at most a couple of minutes.

“It looked like they had just smashed the front door window, grabbed the stuff and left.”

Police confirmed they were called at approximately 1.55am to reports of a non-residential burglary at a premises on St John’s Wood High Street.

A spokeswoman said: “The suspects arrived in a blue BMW and gained entry by smashing the doors. They then took a number of items of clothing from the store and made off in the direction of Allitsen Road.”

No arrests have been made and enquiries continue.

The French brand, which has many shops worldwide including 10 in London, produces clothing for men, women and children and was founded in 1997.

If anyone has information relating to the incident they are asked to call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.