Celeb couple’s luxury car stolen from Sydney mansion
A man who broke into the rental home of comedian Hamish Blake and his entrepreneur wife Zoe Foster Blake while they were asleep and stole their luxury car has learned his fate.
Daniel Booth broke into the four-bedroom house being rented by the high-profile couple in Woollahra, in Sydney’s glittering eastern suburbs, on December 20, 2021.
Court documents reveal the 35-year-old illegally entered the kitchen of the $4900-a-week rental home at 6am and stole the keys to the couple’s Land Rover Defender while they slept.
Mr and Ms Blake had been renting the home over Christmas in 2021 while renovating their $8.92m home in the waterfront suburb of Vaucluse.
He also stole Ms Foster Blake’s handbag, which contained the keys to her white Tesla, $1000 in cash, a very expensive designer wallet and her driver’s licence.
Booth got into the Tesla without the beauty maven’s permission but left it parked at the property with the key inside, according to court documents.
However, he did take the Land Rover, which is valued at more than $123,000 and contained thousands of dollars of camping and fishing equipment.
Mr Blake activated the tracking device on the luxury car and traced it to an address in Redfern.
Police arrived and arrested Booth, who had the car key and Ms Foster Blake’s handbag in his possession.
The arrest put an end to his lengthy crime spree, which began on the afternoon of December 3, 2021 when he stole a grey Volkswagen convertible as the owner watched.
Court documents stated Booth drove off with a car door and the boot still open in his haste to flee the scene.
He then entered a cafe in Waterloo and snatched a pink and brown Guess handbag from a woman, who bravely chased him down as he jumped into the stolen Volkswagen.
She managed to wrestle her bag back and a bystander removed the key from the car, so Booth was forced to flee on foot.
In the early hours of December 14, Booth again snuck into a house and stole the keys to a grey Audi A3 and a Calvin Klein handbag.
He found debit cards in the stolen handbag and used them to his advantage, spending hundreds of dollars on cigarettes alone.
The stolen car was located in a carpark in Redfern, near where Booth was living at the time of his arrest.
He also admitted to groping a female Corrective Services officer while in custody before telling her: “Sorry miss.”
Booth appeared at Sydney’s Downing Centre District Court on Friday after pleading guilty to a raft of charges related to the crime spree.
He wore black-rimmed glasses and a prison green T-shirt as he was beamed into the courtroom via audiovisual link.
Judge Donna Woodburne SC told the court Booth was on parole at the time of his offending, having only been released from prison two weeks earlier.
The charges he was sentenced for include two offences of aggravated breaking and entering with the intention to commit a serious indictable offence, steal from a person, take and drive conveyance, and sexually touching another person without consent.
Judge Woodburne also took into account three charges of taking and driving a car without the consent of the owner, entering a vehicle without the owner’s consent, seven counts of dishonestly obtaining property by deception, stealing an item worth less than $2000, and sexually touching another person without consent.
She told the court Booth had a tough childhood, with his grandparents a part of the stolen generation which severely impacted his family.
The court was told the 35-year-old had only been out of prison for a total of one year of his adult life.
“It is plain Mr Booth’s life has been marred by significant degradation and trauma,” the judge said.
“He is both a physically and psychologically unwell man … triggering his trauma, causing considerable psychological stress.”
Judge Woodburne sentenced Booth to an aggregate term of imprisonment of four years, with a non parole period of two years, two months and four days.
The sentence was backdated to his arrest on December 20, 2021, meaning he is eligible for parole on Friday.
He will not be released on parole, but his lawyers can apply to the State Parole Authority for his release.