A PAIR of Romanian migrants have been jailed after they stole thousands of pounds from small post offices and shops by tricking staff into handing over cash — including at Go Mobile in Okehampton.

Loi Rostas and his brother Pitu roamed the country looking for village shops where they used ‘Faganesque’ sleight of hand to baffle and deceive staff.

They made regular forays to the West Country where they struck three times in Plymouth before moving on to Launceston, Bude, Bideford and Barnstaple.

The also stole from bigger stores where they one would distract the cashier by constantly taking goods in and out of their cart and appearing to change his mind while the other would sneak his hand into the till and grab the takings.

They were finally caught after trying the trick once too often at a B&Q store in Barnstaple where their antics reduced the female cashier to tears and staff noted the number of their car.

Their most common ruse was to go into a small post office in a village or suburb and change £500 into Euros or US dollars.

They would pretend to be confused about what they were doing before asking the post office to transfer the money by Western Union, a facility which post offices do not offer.

The brothers would then cancel the whole transaction, receive their £500 back, and return the foreign currency.They caused such confusion and were so dextrous that the cashier did not spot them removing almost all of the Euros or dollars before the pile of notes was returned.

They operated out of their homes in Birmingham but roamed as far as Tyneside, Leeds and Reading, although their favourite targets were in Devon and Cornwall.

The pair worked their trick at the Go Mobile shop in Okehampton.

Miss Bathsheba Cassel, prosecuting, said the first offence took place at a small post office at Leyburn in North Yorkshire in May 2015 where Loi and another man stole 360 Euros by removing them sneakily from a bundle of 650 before cancelling the transaction and returning them over the counter.

Loi repeated the trick all over the country, often with the help of Pitu, and they also carried out distraction thefts as other shops, including Go Mobile in Okehampton where they stole two phones worth a total of £1,100.

She said: ’A number of the victims were rural or small post offices, which tend to struggle at the best of times.’

They were finally arrested in May this year when police stopped their car on its way out of Barnstaple . They were found with £4,380 cash. The total amount they stole was £7,845.

Loi Rostas carried out some of the thefts with a man who is still being hunted by police while Pitu helped him with nine of them

Loi Rostas, aged 26, of Romford Lane , Washwood Heath, Birmingham , admitted 17 thefts or attempted thefts and Pitu, aged 34, of Kempson Road , Birmingham , admitted nine.

Loi was jailed for a year and eight months and Pitu for a year and four months by Judge Geoffrey Mercer, QC, at Exeter Crown Court.

He told them: ’These offences took place over a year up and down the country and you travelled extensively to commit them.

’These were planned offences which were carried out skilfully and have rightly been described as professional. You used sleight of hand or distraction and the total amount obtained was just under £8,000.

’What you did had obvious effects on the people from whom you stole, some of whom worked in remote post offices or shops.’ 

Mr Forz Khan, defending, said Loi has two children and Pitu has eight. Both their wives have returned to Romania since their arrest and they both plan to return there on their release.

He said: ’They bitterly regret what they have done and want to apologise. These offences were opportunistic and almost Faganesque. There was never any violence, or weapons or threats.

’They took the money and left. It was relatively petty offending but on a repeated scale. The shops were not vulnerable and the sums taken would not affect the running or profitability of the post offices.’

The judge ruled that the money seized from the car should be used to pay partial compensation on a pro rata basis.