Serial dine-and-dashers lastly dealing with their simply desserts

Over the last nine months restaurants in South Wales have waited with baited breath for the police to catch a couple who could just be Britain’s worst customers.

Arriving in a blue Ford van, and often with a large group of people including children tailing behind them, the pair order the most expensive dishes on the menu – typically steaks – along with starters and fizzy drinks.

However, when the time comes to pay the bill, problems arise. Cards get declined, they run out of cash and, when the owners at staff aren’t looking, the previously happy customers make a run for it without squaring their tab.

Their antics, which have been branded ‘devastating’ by one of their alleged victims, have left a trail of businesses flailing in their wake and unable to contact them after being supplied with ‘fake’ phone numbers.

Furious restaurateurs, who between them were left more than £1,000 out of pocket, splashed CCTV images of their outrageous behaviour on social media, sparking fury among the public, and a manhunt from law enforcement.

The couple, since revealed to be Bernard McDonagh, 41, and his wife Ann McDonagh, 39, were quickly identified as other eateries came forward to accuse them of wrong doing, and the police came knocking on the door of their Port Talbot home.

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Since then the law has finally caught up with them – but not before they had the front windows at their three-bedroom Port Talbot home smashed by a gang of men dressed in black balaclavas in an apparent act of retribution.

Today Mr and Mrs McDonagh appeared at court today where they pleaded guilty to five counts of fraud in relation to their dine and dash antics, with the total bill coming in at £1,168. 

Mrs McDonagh also admitted to shoplifting £1,017 in goods from Tommy Hilfiger, Sainsbury’s and Tesco, and obstructing a police officer.

Mr McDonagh, wearing a grey tweed blazer and navy trousers covered his face with his hand as he was confronted by journalists outside Swansea Magistrates’ Court today. 

The father-of-three, whose wife covered up her face with her parka coat hood and hands, remained stony-faced and tight-lipped when asked ‘are you ashamed of your actions?’

There was no response when asked why he thought the rules didn’t apply to him. 

It’s a question that the restaurant owners hit by the couple’s crime spree, which took place between August 2023 and April this year, might want to ask too given this behaviour has the potential to ruin their businesses.

Emily Langford, manager of the family-run restaurant the Yard, in Cowbridge, believes she is one of their victims.

She told MailOnline last month that each member of the group ordered starters, mains and two bottles of fizzy drinks each.

Once they had finished, most of them allegedly left the premises, leaving the woman to settle the tab.

She allegedly came to the counter and tried to pay with her card, which was declined twice, before asking staff for the nearest cashpoint and disappearing out of sight after walking out the door.

Ms Langford told MailOnline: ‘They left the woman to pay. And she stood up and said ‘Oh, is it okay? If I come to the bar to pay?’ and we said that was fine.

‘She was basically buttering me and my mum up and was saying lots of nice things to us. But as she put her card in it got declined. She was like ‘oh that’s weird’ and it declined again.

‘She said she would call her son and sort out a bank transfer, but we weren’t comfortable with that and asked if she could pay in cash and showed her where the nearest cash point was.

‘I showed her where it was and as I turned my head back through the door to tell my mum she was at the cash point, by the time I turned around again she was gone.’

This ‘dine and dash’ playbook has been allegedly deployed by the couple in each of the outlets they have hit in the last year.

Despite all seven restaurants reporting the couple to the police, the force are still working to identify them and track them down.

Ms Langford said the theft was ‘devastating’ for her restaurant, which she runs with both her mother and father.

She said: ‘It’s devastating. Because obviously, all hospitality is really, really struggling at the minute, like we’ll put our hands up and say we’re not doing as well as we were doing a couple of years ago, and I’m sure that a lot of hospitality are feeling the same as well, and we know restaurants that are closing around us.

‘There’s not many restaurants left here in Cowbridge and the High Street here is dying. I just don’t want it to happen to anybody else.’

When the couple walked into Bella Ciao Italian restaurant in Swansea earlier this year as part of a group of eight they racked up a £329 bill, they had no qualms about leaving without paying the bill.

CCTV footage from the restaurant showed Mrs McDonagh attempting to pay the bill with a savings account card, which was declined twice.

She told staff her son would wait inside while she went to get her ‘other card’, but she did not return and moments later the boy had also vanished from the premises.

The family-owned restaurant learned too late that there was no way to contact the diners after they had left as the number they used to take the booking was ‘fake’.

The owners were left with no choice but to share CCTV footage of the couple’s behaviour, video of which went viral last month after more than 12million people viewed it online.  

It was found that a similar trick was used by the couple at the River House last year, when they ran up a hefty bill whilst sitting on a table of five and ‘promised’ to get cash from the local cash point after their card got declined.

But the diners never returned, leading the restaurant owners to call the police.

After hearing the Bella Ciao story, the La Casona restaurant in Skewen, Neath, took to social media to share a similar story about the couple, who sat down to eat as a group of six on February 23.

According to the restaurant, four of the group left the building after finishing their meal, which cost nearly £300, leaving the mother to stay with a ‘young boy’ to pay.

The business posted a CCTV image of the mother, who told staff she would get another card from her car after the one she used was declined.

The restaurant asked the boy to wait with them whilst she went to the car, but he was gone 10 seconds later and never returned.

It is a pattern that seems to extend to their dealings outside restaurants as well.

Phil Carey, the owner of a blinds company, claimed alleged he may have been stiffed by the couple as well.

He told MailOnline last month: ‘When I went around to measure up all the windows in the house, I gave her the bill for £850 and she made some excuse about having to leave to take her baby to the doctor.

‘She said she would pay the money by bank transfer. I started to think I was going to have a problem. I’m a one-man band and £850 is a lot of money. People have advised me to go to the police or the small claims court but I don’t think I’ll get what I’m owed.’

They could be jailed for their actions when they appear at crown court for sentencing later this month – leaving a restaurant without paying carries a prison sentence of up to two years.

In magistrates court today the pair, who have three children under the age of 16,  admitted to five counts of fraud, as well as charges of theft.

The court heard that the couple’s dine and dash spree began on August 9, last year, when they dipped out on a £267 bill at River House restaurant in Swansea.

This was followed by failing to pay a £99.40 bill at Golden Fortune, Port Talbot, on January 31, 2024, and a £267.60 bill at La Casona restaurant in Skewen on February 24, 2024.

They then went on to skip out on paying a £196 bill at Isabella’s restaurant Porthcawl, on March 27, before the most recent offence at Bella Ciao where they failed to pay a £329 bill.

Ann McDonagh, who has has 18 convictions from 36 offences including fraud and theft, also admitted thefts from two supermarkets as well as one count of obstructing or resisting a police officer.

The thefts included taking clothes she didn’t pay for at the Tommy Hilfiger shop at Bridgend Designer Outlet, South Wales.

The value of the items were £442 on February 3, 2024, and £49 on February 17, 2024.

She also pleaded guilty to obtaining household items to the value of £426.60 from a Tesco Extra store in Swansea on September 6, 2023.

Ann McDonagh also took items to the value of £400 from Sainsbury’s at Bridgend Designer Outlet on February 25, 2024.

Her husband also has previous convictions for theft. 

Giles Hayes, mitigating for the pair who hail from Sandfields, Port Talbot, said: ‘They are equally culpable of the offences.’

They were bailed ahead of a sentencing hearing later this month at Swansea Crown Court. Both refused to comment when they left the court. 

District Judge Chris James said the couple would be sentenced at Swansea Crown Court later this month because the offences were aggravated by children being involved.