Hatton Garden jewellery heist – nine still in custody

Nine men aged between 43 and 73 remain in custody following their arrest yesterday by police officers investigating the raid on the Hatton Garden safe. All nine were arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to burgle.

Among those arrested were two men held in Kent, named widely in reports as Brian Reader, 76, and his 50-year-old son also named Brian but known in some cases as Paul. Police forensics are now focusing their attention on their £800,000 manor home in Dartford where the pair were arrested.

Read Alex Thomson: Hatton Garden heist: two Brians and a building site

Police said they have recovered bags containing “significant amounts of high-value property” at one of the addresses they have been searching. More than 200 officers were involved in raids carried out across north London and Kent yesterday.

A gang of thieves broke into the vault at Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Company over the Easter weekend. The Met has faced criticism for not responding to the first emergency call put in from a security firm on Good Friday. 72 safety boxes were looted in the raid.

Still a mystery

Detectives from the Flying Squad were forced to apologise after it emerged that alarm response procedures had not been followed.

The President of the London Diamond Bourse – a trade and lobby group representing London’s diamond industry – said it was “still a mystery” as to why the police did not turn up when the alarm was raised but was “delighted” by the arrests.He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme:

“I was absolutely delighted when I heard yesterday that they had recovered quite a substantial amount of, as they put it, high value property.”