A 25-year-old man has been jailed after he was part of a burglary gang which “ransacked” a family home in Keighley and stole jewellery worth £12,000.

A judge heard on Thursday how the gang had travelled to the scene of the break-in last month in a Ford Fiesta before they were spotted by a neighbour forcing the lock on the front door with a pair of mole-grips.

Prosecutor Philip Adams told Bradford Crown Court that the pregnant mum-of-six who lived at the property was not at home when the intruders broke in on the night of May 21 and her husband was also abroad at the time.

“Once inside the group ransacked the house,” said Mr Adams.

“The complainant said her bedroom was a mess with items thrown all about the room and drawers and cupboards emptied.”

The gang stole a dozen gold bangles worth £1,000 each as well as other jewellery and three computer tablets.

The neighbour had alerted the police and Mr Adams said when officers arrived in a number of vehicles they saw Simon Fox and another unknown male running from the house.

Mr Adams said the pair ran towards the Ford Fiesta and although one of them was driven away Fox was detained at the scene.

The court heard that Fox, of Upper Mosscarr Street, Bradford, had thrown away the mole-grips and they still had the barrel from the broken lock clamped between its teeth.

In a victim impact statement the pregnant woman said she had suffered high blood pressure and sleeplessness since the burglary and she no longer felt safe in her own home.

Fox had previous convictions for house burglary and attempted burglary and at the time of the break-in he was already on a community order for theft from motor vehicles.

Two days after the house raid he pleaded guilty to burglary and going equipped offences when he appeared before the magistrates court and today he was sentenced to 28 months in jail.

Judge Colin Burn heard that Fox was realistic about the position he had found himself in and was well aware of the likely outcome.

“The fact is this is a very serious burglary because of the impact it had on the householder,” he told Fox.

Judge Burn said the ransacking of the bedroom together with the fact that there were three people involved were aggravating features of the case.

“The sentence falls firmly into the first category of dwelling house burglary and after a trial, in my judgement, it would have been 42 months,” said Judge Burn.

But he explained that Fox’s early guilty plea at the magistrates court meant he was entitled a discount of one third which reduced his sentence to two years and four months.