A TEENAGER was hauled before magistrates after ransacking a home and making off with £61,000 worth of goods.

The 16-year-old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, pleaded guilty to one count of burglary and two driving offences: driving while disqualified and without insurance.

The court heard that the defendant, along with an adult facing similar charges in crown court, unlawfully entered a house in Marlborough Road on January 8 while the occupants were away on holiday.

The family returned home to find windows smashed and doors hanging off their hinges in what was described by defence solicitor Ben Worthington as a very unpleasant offence.

The cost of repairing the damage to one of the bedrooms, the court heard, was estimated to be more than £1,000.

And the items that were stolen included expensive designer clothes, such as shoes worth £900 per pair.

CCTV at the property caught people accessing the property three times over the course of the burglary and the 16-year-old freely admitted being behind the wheel of a car that he should not have been driving.

A victim impact statement was read to the court on Tuesday in which the homeowner, who wasn’t named, described the experience in great detail.

He said: “In January my family and I returned to find our house had been ransacked by burglars – it looked like a bombsite.

“The children couldn’t understand why their rooms had been vandalised in such a way.

“As a family we were in a state of shock, but my wife and I knew we had to make light of it for the sake of our children.

“The thought that these people had been coming and going into our house at will made us very uncomfortable.

“This whole incident has been a tough thing to deal with and it has affected my family more than I would have thought.”

Ben Worthington, defending, said: “This is not in any way shape or form a pleasant offence. My client hasn’t heard that victim statement before and he is probably wishing the ground would swallow him up right now.

“He is very clearly a young man who unfortunately has turned to burglary as something that is exciting and stimulating for him.

“He has been taken advantage off by more sophisticated adult offenders who routinely do these sorts of things.”

The court heard that, despite stealing £61,000 worth of goods, the 16-year-old pocketed just £500 from the raid.

But since the burglary, the defendant has taken steps to turn his life around and he told magistrates of his desire to do well in his exams.

Mr Worthington said: “People say that a leopard can’t change its spots, but he does seem to be changing and growing up.”

After a long deliberation, magistrates imposed a 30-month youth rehabilitation order which will require the defendant to observe a curfew keeping him indoors between the hours of 6pm and 8am.

He was warned that he was very close to a custodial sentence.

For the driving offences he was banned for 24-months and his parents were told to pay £85 towards the cost of prosecution and a £20 victim surcharge.