Shoplifter: Jayne Rand (Picture: Wales News Service)

A housewife is facing jail for taking 905 designer handbags in a nationwide ‘campaign of shoplifting’ that lasted three years before she was arrested.

Jayne Rand stole goods worth £500,000 including creations by Mulberry, Prada, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Dior and Burberry.

The mother of two made more than £80,000 by selling 838 of the bags to other women, a court heard.

When she was finally caught by security staff at a shopping centre, two bags stolen earlier that day were found in her car.


‘For all intents and purposes, she has carried out a business and we are talking about tens of thousands of pounds,’ said Judge Rhys Rowlands.



Rand, thought to be Britain’s biggest handbag thief, used a simple technique that worked time and again before she was arrested in Cwmbran, South Wales. She would go into shops without a handbag, select one that caught her eye and remove the security tag, before walking out with it on her arm.

‘The defendant was only caught because people in Cwmbran happen to be quite diligent,’ said Judge Rowlands.

The cost price of the items stolen by Rand, of Swindon, was more than £130,000 after shop mark-ups were discounted, Newport crown court heard.

The 48-year-old, who admitted theft and converting criminal assets, faces a substantial prison term despite previous good character. She is out on conditional bail and will be sentenced later this month.