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Notícias One of UK's most prolific shoplifters reveals how 12-word phrase helped her steal £30m

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One of UK's most prolific shoplifters reveals how 12-word phrase helped her steal £30m

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Keeley Knowles would fool shop staff by phoning them up pretending to be a police officer to check when security would be on before stashing gear inside a long coat which she'd slashed a hole in

One of Britain's most prolific shoplifters has told how she would stuff stolen gear inside a secret compartment in a long overcoat to make off with around £30 million worth of goods during a 20 year crime spree. Jailbird Keeley Knowles, 42, revealed how she would fool shop staff by phoning them up pretending to be a police officer to check when security would be on the doors.

She would target shops every morning and raked in up to £8,000 a day flogging the hooky items via a WhatsApp group in order to fund her heroin addiction.

Keeley stole high value items such as designer clothing and handbags from upmarket stores around Birmingham and reckons she pinched £3.7 million worth of stock from one city shop alone.

Revealing the tricks of her trade during a chat with YouTuber Birmz Is Grime, she said: "I'd get up in the morning and ring around different stores and I would say: 'Good morning this is PC2417, I'm calling about the theft on Tuesday.'

"Because there was always a theft, it's a big store. And then you would always get some really lovely woman who would answer the phone saying 'there's no security today'. And I would say 'oh well, can you tell me when they are back in?' They would tell me they are not in Monday, Thursday and Friday. And I'd be writing all this down.

"I wore a long Michael Kors sleeping bag coat and sliced it inside. And I'd fill it, right from the floor to up under my armpit. I wouldn't use a bag to shoplift. I've had alarms go off and I'd let them look in my handbag and then just walk outside.

"To make a thousand pounds you've got to steal a lot of stuff a day. Some days I'd steal £7,000 to £8,000 worth of stock. "The only days I never shoplifted was Christmas Day and Good Friday when the shops weren't open. So those were my only two days off."

Keeley said she first got in to a life of crime when she was just 13 when she was groomed by a 21-year-old man and she was soon hooked on heroin. She was brought up by her grandparents as her dad was in jail and she didn't see my mum.

She said she would get arrested and jailed on annual basis and her long-suffering grandparents — who were initially oblivious to her drug habit — would visit her in prison.

And she was so well known to store security staff in the city that one wished her happy birthday recently. She said: "I got in trouble a lot when I as younger, firearms and drugs.

"I got away with murder, I think my nan thought I had flu for years, when I was suffering withdrawals. But they were there through everything. I got arrested and went to prison around once a year. There's a store in Selly Oak and their security guard once told an officer I had taken £3.7 million worth of stock.

"And Loss Prevention magazine have estimated it at around £30 million. But if you're estimating that from me going into a shop once a day, I promise you its more than that. I'd steal so much I'd have to go get a trolley from Sainsbury's just to move it.

So many security know me, it's shocking. To the point one stopped me the other week, I haven't been in trouble for so long either, to say happy birthday. I said 'how do you know its my birthday?' and he said 'Keeley I've had to fill out your date of birth constantly for how many years'.

"There's no rush to it, it was just what I had to do to feed my addiction. I didn't live, I just existed. I just got up, scored, went grafting, sold it, scored, slept - and I did it all over again.

"I had a WhatsApp group that had around 150 people in it, I'd take photos on the train or bus after coming out of a shop and before I even got half way home it would be sold. Money would either go in my bank or I would go and drop it off and collect the money. I knew when people's pay days were, what size their kids were, what people's favourite designer was."

Keeley, who has been jailed 28 times in the UK and three times in Amsterdam, is now 18 months clean having turned her life around and is now sharing her story as a warning to others.

She said her saving grace was West Midlands Police's Offending to Recovery programme, which offers support for addicts, and she now works alongside the programme, doing outreach work with drug users and gives talks on the drug Buvidal, a slow-release opioid blocker.

She has also won a National Business crime solutions award and since reconnected with her family. She added: "I didn't live, I just existed. I just got up, scored, went grafting, sold it, scored, slept - and I did it all over again. I thought I would die a junkie. I was unfixable, don't write anyone off. If I can be fixed, anyone can be fixed."

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