A burglar wanted by police for break-ins across England has been sentenced to eight years in jail.

Peter Sonny Martin O’Halloran, 34, of no fixed abode, was on the most-wanted list for two years.

After his arrest in a Wandsworth hotel in February 6 this year police officers traced items he stole, worth around £100,000, to another man in Sutton.

O’Halloran was sentenced last Wednesday after pleading guilty to nine counts of burglary and one offence of transferring criminal property.

Surrey Police joined the hunt for O’Halloran when he committed burglaries across the county in December 2008.

Detective Inspector Martin Goodwin said: “The sentence shows the effectiveness of Operation Shield in stopping offenders who cause harm in Surrey, regardless of where they live.

“Officers in West Surrey did an excellent job identifying the burglary pattern and securing valuable evidence.

“They worked with detectives from the Cross-Border Investigation Team to track O’Halloran down and recover his stolen goods.

“Through tenacious police work, we have been able to identify many of the stolen items and return them to grateful owners across the country.

“Surrey Police has six intelligence officers embedded full-time in neighbouring forces, which improves the way we share information so we can jointly target and quickly arrest offenders who travel to commit crime.

“As this case has shown, we’re also ready and willing to work with colleagues even further afield. Let this be a warning to criminals that they cannot evade justice by moving around the country.”

O’Halloran pleaded guilty to six burglaries in Surrey, burglaries in Gloucestershire, Cambridgeshire and Oxfordshire, and transferring criminal property in Suffolk.

Thirty-nine other offences were also taken into consideration by the court.

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