A BURGLAR was caught “red-handed” when his victim could see him raiding her home on her mobile after her phone was linked up to her home CCTV security system.

Lynn Regan watched live footage of Ryan Edwards ransacking her house in Newport whilst she was in work before she called the police who arrested him in the act.

The 25-year-old thief was jailed for nearly two-and-a-half years after admitting the offence and being in breach of a suspended sentence for the burglary of a Tesco store.

Prosecutor Rosamund Rutter told Cardiff Crown Court how Mrs Regan, whose husband was working abroad at the time, had left her Elaine Crescent home to go to her job as a health care professional.

The judge, Recorder Gregory Treverton-Jones QC, heard how she was notified in the early hours of Sunday, August 26, whilst in work, through her phone that there was “activity” in her house.

Miss Rutter said: “To her horror, she could see two people in her property on the CCTV.

“She contacted the police who attended very quickly.

“Because of technology, she was able to watch live two males in her property when she wasn’t there.”

The police arrested Edwards but the other man, who have never been identified, got away and has not been caught.

Miss Rutter revealed how that burglar escaped with jewellery of a “sentimental value” worth £8,000.

She said police did manage to recover designer handbags, an iPad and a mobile phone from outside the property but the victim had to throw away some of her clothes because they had been "soiled".

The court was told how Edwards had caught a taxi from his native city of Cardiff before he decided to target Mrs Regan’s home in St Julians and broken in after throwing a stone through a back window.

Miss Rutter added that the defendant had told detectives after being arrested that he needed money to live on and was dependent on cannabis.

In a victim impact statement read out to the court by the prosecutor, Mrs Regan said that as a result of the raid: “My confidence has been shattered.”

Edwards had eight previous convictions for 15 offences, including a dwelling burglary in 2014 for which he was jailed for two years.

He was also in breach of a suspended 20-week prison sentence imposed by Cardiff magistrates in June for the non-dwelling burglary at the Tesco supermarket.

Jon Lewis for Edwards said the best mitigation he could put forward was that his client had immediately pleaded guilty.

The judge said the defendant, of Greenbay Road, Tremorfa, Cardiff, had been caught “red-handed” and jailed him for two years for the Newport burglary and activated the suspended sentence, making a combined prison term of 124 weeks.