A FORMER Halesowen security guard who raided five homes in the Dudley area described himself as a “one-man crime wave” when he was arrested.

Ben McCaffer had drug problems when he first broke into the home of a 72-year-old Cradley Heath man while he was asleep getting away with property including £250 in cash and a mobile telephone.

Judge Marcus Tregilgas-Davey told 30-year-old McCaffer: "You went into his room which must have been extremely frightening for anyone and he has suffered a great deal by what you did.

"For a man in his twilight years to feel like that is disgraceful," said the judge as he ordered McCaffer to be locked up for a total of 42 months.

McCaffer admitted burgling the pensioner's home in Wagon Street and also raiding four other homes in the Tividale, Langley, Netherton and Halesowen area.

Fiona Cortese prosecuting said McCaffer took property including jewellery and two passports from the house in Langley where his fingerprints were found at the scene.

The burglar took jewellery and a TV from a house in Maple Road, Halesowen while the owner was in hospital and he got away with two TV's, cash and jewellery from the house in Double Row, Netherton.

Miss Cortese told Wolverhampton Crown Court that McCaffer had committed four of the raids while on bail after being arrested for the Cradley Heath burglary and he had left his fingerprints at two more of the properties.

And after smashing his way into the Netherton house he left behind a blood stain which enabled police officers to identity him through DNA testing.

McCaffer, of Nimmings Road, admitted five burglary charges committed between June and November this year and the judge ruled only an immediate jail term was appropriate for his offending.

Blondelle Thompson defending said McCaffer who had 65 previous offences on his criminal record had reverted back to drugs because serious illness in the family and he was now "ashamed of the level he has fallen to."

She said the father of three was now determined to put his life back onto the rails on his release from custody.

"He does not want to keep going in and out of custody," said Miss Thompson.