Three men have been jailed for stealing weight loss drugs worth nearly £1million from a healthcare distribution centre in St Albans.
The break-in took place shortly before 6.40pm on January 24 at a facility on Handley Page Way.
A total of 79 boxes of Mounjaro, valued at £944,544.89, were stolen from a refrigerated storage unit.
Mark Harding and Peter Costello were the first to force entry, blacking out internal cameras before taking several boxes of the drug.
They returned less than two hours later with Robert Townsend and stole more than 70 additional boxes.
All three men were later arrested after police used phone records, CCTV footage, and automatic number plate recognition to identify them.
They were arrested after simultaneous warrants were executed at the trio's homes on February 11 uncovered a combined total of £60,000 in cash.
The money was hidden among picnic baskets and extractor fans.
Robert Townsend, 59, of Lower Pillory Down, Carshalton, pleaded guilty to burglary and possessing criminal property on April 30.
Two weeks earlier, Peter Costello, 44, of Sydney Road, Sutton, and Mark Harding, 55, of Chertsey Road, Feltham, also pleaded guilty to burglary.
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Harding admitted an additional charge of possessing criminal property.
At St Albans Crown Court on Wednesday (July 8), the judge sentenced all three men to five years and three months in prison for burglary.
Harding and Townsend were handed an additional nine-month prison sentence, to be served concurrently, for possessing criminal property.
Detective Sergeant Will Daglish said: “I am pleased that Townsend, Costello and Harding pleaded guilty in court and admitted these large-scale offences.
"This was a very serious crime - weight loss drugs must be stored correctly and are dangerous if they are not administered in the right way.
"By breaking into the fridges storing the Mounjaro drug, their actions posed a serious health risk to the public.
"This was evidently a pre-planned and calculated burglary, and they will now serve several years behind bars."
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