2:53PM, Wed May 30, 2012

Car Thieves Cheat Death As They Wreck Brand New BMW In Newcastle

By Hugh Macknight Location: Newcastle

Thieves cheated death when they smashed a brand new £67,000 BMW they had stolen into a lamp post.

The gleaming white seven series was completely written off when Ryan Sommerville and Sean Shotton crashed at 120mph.

The vehicle was parked on the driveway of furniture dealer Ifty Ahmed’s luxury home in Kenton Bank Foot, Newcastle, when the raiders slipped inside in the early hours.

They stole the keys then, with the police in pursuit, sped through Seaton Burn and Gosforth and onto the A1.

Sneak thief Ryan Sommerville, jailed for 33 months

They lost control and the car collided with a pedestrian barrier then lamp-post and ended up wedged between railings and a roundabout wall over the Western Bypass.

The defendants were trapped inside by the concrete wall on one side and the railings on the other and had to be pulled to safety through the car windows, Newcastle Crown Court heard.

Furniture dealer Ifty, 32, was asleep upstairs with his wife and children, aged 11, 10, and six, when the pair broke in.

Sneak thief Sean Shotton, jailed for 30 months

The BMW belonged to Ifty’s brother Balal, 36, who had purchased it just two months earlier.

Sommerville and Shotton, both 20, and from Etal Lane, Newbiggin Hall, Newcastle, were jailed after admitting aggravated vehicle taking and burglary.