A PROLIFIC burglar posing as a cop to get into the homes of elderly and vulnerable victims has been slapped with six years in a secure unit. Peter Kerrigan, a 22-year-old from Hackney in East London, has admitted to well over 1,400 burglaries since 2002 when he was still at school

By Mike Brooke

A PROLIFIC burglar posing as a cop to get into the homes of elderly and vulnerable victims has been slapped with six years in a secure unit.

Peter Kerrigan, a 22-year-old from Hackney in East London, has admitted to well over 1,000 burglaries since 2002 when he was still at school.

He was sent to a secure unit yesterday (Tuesday) for a string of burglaries just weeks after being released early from an eight-year stretch in the North of England for previous offences.

Kerrigan had became the most wanted conman in Britain by the age of 16, sought after by five police forces.

He had committed burglaries in Hampshire, Kent, Surrey, Essex, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Northampton and Cambridgeshire, before being arrested in Peterborough in 2003 and jailed on 13 charges.

Kerrigan had also asked for nearly 1,400 more burglaries in nine police force areas to be taken into consideration.

He was back in the dock yesterday for sentencing after admitting six more burglaries in June and July, most of them on his home turf’ in Hackney, when he appeared at Inner London Crown Court.

Kerrigan targeted vulnerable, elderly victims from 75 to 92, usually in blocks of flats or residential homes, often posing as a police officer and making any excuse to get inside. He tricked the elderly in Hackney, Homerton and Clapton, where one woman of 83 had �820 stolen.

Kerrigan was finally tracked down while preparing to skip to country.

Now police are appealing for any more victims who think they may have fallen victim to Kerrigan (pictured above) to call the investigation team on 020-8247 5721.