THE brazen thief who struck at a Southend jewellers has been jailed – thanks to the Echo.

Dorian McCallum didn’t realise he was being filmed on CCTV cameras as he snatched a pricey gold chain.

He had strolled into Andrews Jewellers, in Southchurch Road, Southend, posing as a genuine customer.

But when owner Andy Levy brought a £550 Prince Albert pocket watch chain out to show him, he simply grabbed it and fled.

He was even cheeky enough to say: “thank you very much” as he ran out of the store at about 3.50pm on Thursday, July 5.

The Echo promptly issued a CCTV picture of the crook and asked our readers for help.

This led an anonymous tipster to call police giving his name.

All they needed to do was use the Police National Computer which flagged up where he lived, in Woodland Vale Road, in St Leonards-on-Sea, East Sussex.

McCallum, 33, pleaded guilty to the theft during a brief hearing at Southend Magistrates’ Court. He was sent to prison for 42 days.

PC Martin Knights, of Southend police’s town beat section, said: “It’s a good result. Thanks to the CCTV going in the paper so early on, I think we caught him a lot quicker than we would have done, having gone through the normal channels.

“I think it just shows how important it is to issue CCTV, and in this instance it helped no end.”

Mr Levy, 54, said they get crimes of this type at least once a year – so he was glad someone had been jailed.

He said: “I haven’t got my goods back, but what can you do? At least he was caught.”