Shocking second gang of thieves ransack London clothes retailer and make off with £1,700 value of products as terrified workers watch on helplessly

A shop owner has been left around £10,000 out of pocket following a spate of shoplifting incidents at her luxury clothing business.

London-based fashion label, Jovonna London, has faced repeated shoplifting attempts from brazen thieves across its four stores, which have left the business reeling and staff fearing for their safety. 

One incident captured on CCTV just last month showed a gang of thieves make off with more than £1,700 of merchandise in a brazen theft in broad daylight. 

Shocking footage shows two women wearing caps and carrying several large shopping bags entering the shop and appearing to browse through some of the items on sale at around 3.30pm. 

The pair soon rouse the suspicions of two female staff members, who suddenly attempt to close the shop door and prevent the thieves from leaving. 

However, as soon as they approach the entrance, a third person – a man -steps in front of the door before telling the staff: ‘Don’t you dare.’

The thieves then proceed to stuff items into their bags and even rip off two £750 fur coats from the shop’s mannequins, before making a swift exit. 

Business owner Jojo, told the Daily Mail that while the business has seen a spate of theft in recent years, this is the ‘most severe’ and felt like a ‘targeted’ attack as the thieves knew which items to target and where they were. 

‘My staff noticed the two ladies were stealing things they wanted to close the door but as you can see the third man was at the door. 

‘They began approaching the door and the man said to them “don’t you dare”. They got intimidated and very scared so they literally went back to the till to let them do their robbery.

‘They took their time to select the size of clothes, pick up the most expensive pieces on the top floor take them off and then they quickly exit the shop and my staff followed them to the door but they didn’t chase them.’

The gang made off with around £1,775 of stock, including the two £750 jackets and a £100 handbag. 

But for Jojo and her staff, incidents like this are no longer exceptional and instead have become almost commonplace across her four stores. 

She said: ‘Incidents like this happen across all of our shops I would say once every six weeks. People have stolen probably £10,000 from us in total. That’s a conservative estimate.

‘But this one is the most severe that’s why I brought to social media. I think we were very angry because it’s like a robbery, it is not shoplifting. 

‘We got threatened and it felt targeted. They knew what they were picking and that’s made us feel like we were under surveillance, like they were watching us.’

Jojo has begun telling her staff to not get involved when they see thieves stealing items from the store, as she is mindful of their safety. 

‘In a previous incident when we got our shoplifted one of my staff actually ran two blocks and caught the shoplifter. 

‘But I told them to never ever do that again and to just let them take the stock. People’s safety and awareness welfare is the most important.’

Such incidents leave Jojo feeling ‘helpless’ and ‘disappointed’ that she cannot do more to stop brazen thieves targeting the high street. 

‘The financial loss is one thing, but I really don’t want to see my staff feel threatened, to feel they have to face a robbery, face the shoplifting every day they come to work,’ the owner said.  

‘That’s not their job. The worst case scenario is one of my staff getting hurt. That’s what keeps me awake at night.’

She is also frustrated over a perceived lack of support from local police officers and feels low levels crimes such as shoplifting are not taken seriously. 

‘It looks like that when thieves target a small business there’s no consequences. 

‘I don’t expect police to appear every time a robbery happens. I understand that you have limited resources and I understand this is not their priority and I also understand it’s a low-value crime.

‘But I just wondered when is it our turn to be the focus? I can’t tell them and I can’t run a police department. But I want to hear someone tell me and say this is what they gonna do.’   

Jojo has had to take matters into her own hands in preventing the store from becoming a prime target for thieves. 

She no longer stocks high-value merchandise in the Marylebone shop and have trained staff in how best to deal with shoplifting incidents. 

‘Now I just, I can’t be bothered to have expensive items, I just feel like it makes you targeted. It’s not worth it. 

‘So if they know we only selling tops for £16 and coats for a hundred pounds they might not think it’s worth it to do the crime. 

‘As a business owner, we just have to cut losses. It’s not worth it and insurance doesn’t pay out.’

‘It’s a high footfall area but the taking we make isn’t worth it to tag everything. Higher security doesn’t make it make a sense financially. 

‘Even hiring security outside the door is not an option, the cost is too high. 

‘We already have CCTV and we keep the evidence as a warning. 

‘We took as much measures as we could to prevent that happening but everything else just doesn’t make financial sense.’

The incident in October has been reported to the Metropolitan Police, who said they would send officers over to speak with staff following the incident. However, they are yet receive such a visit. 

Jojo is not the only small business being targeted in the area – just down the road from the Jovonna store is the Treasures of Brazil boutique on Thayer Street, which in the last few months alone has been targeted by pickpockets and burglars alike. 

‘We see people getting robbed every day in the area. The shop has been open for a year and a half and it has become almost a daily occurrence,’ the mother-of-two told the Daily Mail. 

‘It is already hard with business rates in central London. Having the problem with security is a burden and shouldn’t be something we have to deal with.’

Recalling a recent break-in in June, when a brazen thief was caught on CCTV breaking into the jewellery shop before making off with an entire safe.

The man, wearing a bright orange jacket and equipped with a leather bag, is later seen rifling through the register and stealing around £100 in cash before casually touring the rest of the store in a desperate attempt to find more loot. 

He eventually stumbles onto the shop’s safe – which luckily held nothing of value -and puts it into his bag, before making a swift exit. 

The break-in came almost a year after another attempt that saw a man try to steal a bag by sliding a pole through the letterbox and trying to hook it off a shelf. Luckily he was unsuccessful and eventually gave up. 

Daiane says she rarely see police patrolling the street and businesses in the area often have to rely on private security firms to respond to any incidents.

She added that staff at the store are ‘constantly on edge’ as they are aware that thieves could strike at any moment. Other businesses on the street are also frequently on guard for any potential troublemakers. 

And just last month, a woman entered the shop and stole two iPhones from the pay counter while distracting the shop assistant at the same time.

CCTV footage of the brazen theft shows the woman entering the shop and approaching the staff member, Ana. 

She appears to be pretending to look for earrings and begins pointing at her ear, while saying something to the staff member in another language. 

The woman then takes a small piece of paper from her pocket and places it on the counter. She points at it saying ‘Portuguese, please’ as if trying to use it to communicate with the manager. 

‘Our shop assistant, Ana, tried to use an online translator to understand her better, thinking she was genuinely struggling to explain what she wanted,’ Daiane explained. 

‘However, while Ana’s attention was on the translation, the woman used the paper to partially cover the phones on the counter and took both.’ 

The woman successfully made off with Ana’s personal phone – an iPhone 13 – as well as the company’s phone – an iPhone 16 Pro – which is used to take pictures and film videos for social media.

After grabbing the phones from the counter, the thief told Ana she would come back in five minutes and left the shop, with no intention of returning. 

Ana followed the woman out to the street, believing she was acting strangely. It was at that point she decided to call security, but when she went to the counter to grab her phone, she realised they were gone. 

The latest Office for National Statistics figures showed almost 81,000 robberies were recorded in England and Wales in the 12 months until June. 

And in London, 33,752 cases were reported. The startling figure is slightly down on 35,169 last year, figures show.

The Met Police said in a statement last month that it is prioritising neighbourhood policing, by putting more officers in local teams to tackle issues that matter most to Londoners, like shoplifting. 

‘Officers are working closely with local business owners across the capital to crack down on the most prolific shoplifters who cause fear to retail workers and have negative impacts on local communities,’ the force added. 

The Met has solved 92 per cent more shoplifting cases so far this year, with its most recent crackdown in the capital resulting in 32 arrests and the recovery of thousands of stolen items.