Owner of UK’s ‘most focused store’ hunts thieves herself utilizing Apple AirTags after they stole £250k value of purses – however they flee after cops fail to get warrant in time

A boutique owner who watched on helplessly as a gang of thieves tunnelled into her store and stole £250,000 worth of luxury handbags is on the hunt to bring them to justice after tracking them down using Apple AirTags. 

Christine Colbert, 58, has turned detective after three masked burglars broke into Dress Cheshire, the beloved boutique she runs in the celebrity enclave of Prestbury, over the summer.

The Daily Mail exclusively revealed CCTV of the extraordinary moment the gang – dressed all in black with balaclavas and head torches – tunnelled their way into the shop and stole £250,000 worth of designer handbags at around 11.30pm on June 8 2025. 

Astonishingly, it came after four men stole £180,000 worth of luxury handbags from Dress Cheshire in March 2024. In the same month, Ms Colbert turned ‘Miss Marple’ to help snare Jack Watkin, the ‘Kardashian of Cheshire’ who conned victims including herself out of thousands of pounds in an elaborate designer handbag scam.

The shocking crimewave continued in August 2024 when the building next door to Dress Cheshire was set ablaze arson attack, which left her shop moments away from being blown up.

In an exclusive interview with the Daily Mail, Ms Colbert has vowed her ‘Miss Marple’ days are far from over as she now goes on the hunt for the thieves who brazenly ransacked her boutique in Cheshire’s Golden Triangle.

She has revealed how some 30 of the 45 bags stolen in the £250k raid had Apple AirTag trackers inside, which enabled her to see where the gang were travelling in real-time as they launched their getaway on the night. 

They came to a halt at a block of four houses – including one with ‘bin bags for curtains’ – in Wythenshawe, south Manchester, but a warrant was unable to be obtained by police. By the time police turned up the next morning, the handbags – including a £30,000 Hermes Kelly crocodile bag – were gone with only the AirTags left behind in nearby undergrowth.

‘It is frustrating,’ Ms Colbert said. ‘I believed if we’d been able to move on the night, that we would have got the bags, 100 per cent. But that would have meant entering [several] people’s homes and we weren’t able to get the warrant that night to do that.’

Challenges in getting a warrant arose from the fact the gang crossed from Cheshire Constabulary to Greater Manchester Police jurisdiction.

Ms Colbert admitted: ‘I understand the procedures, I understand the fact that it went across jurisdictions, I understand that there was effectively four addresses. And I also understand that no judge would give a warrant for four addresses.

‘It wasn’t the lack of police appetite, I think it was the process and procedure.’

Ms Colbert said police have managed to secure strong DNA on the tags that were retrieved, giving her hope they can finally catch the thieves.

Recalling the night of the burglary, Ms Colbert told the Mail: ‘I said to the police officers at the time, I’ve got tags in the bags, so I launched my Find My devices on my phone, and sure enough you could see this cluster of bags traveling towards South Manchester.

‘At about 4am, they settled to a certain area and stopped moving. By 9am the next morning, the tags were still in the vicinity, but very clearly showing in green overgrowth rather than in the housing block. They realised the tags were in the bags and obviously threw them out.’

Ms Colbert was taken to the block of houses with police a few weeks later, where she said there was ‘definitely some curtain twitching’.

‘It wasn’t the nicest area. I think one of the doors looks like it’s had some kind of hammer attack. There was plastic bags on some of the windows in one of the addresses as well. I didn’t feel particularly safe in that area.’

Ms Colbert has been unable to get justice since being forced to watch a group of brazen thieves steal £250,000 worth of luxury handbags after tunnelling through her shop.

Three intruders circumvented Dress Cheshire’s sophisticated security set-up by identifying the 3ft-wide chimney stack as a weakness. 

Having smashed their way through, one used a duvet cover as a giant pouch to steal the highly sought-after pre-owned bags from brands including Chanel, Gucci, Dior, and Louis Vuitton.

Live CCTV footage showed the skilled thieves ransacking the shop, where bags valued at as much as £30,000 were snatched.

The second heist coincided with the start of Watkin’s trial in June. He was jailed for six years in October for scamming his rich friends and relatives out of almost £200,000.

The 26-year-old former public schoolboy promised his victims – including Ms Colbert – a share of the profits if they loaned him cash to buy and sell expensive Hermes bags.

But neither the handbags or any profit ever materialised and instead Watkin used the cash to fund his extravagant lifestyle.

At one stage he spent weeks living at the five-star Dorchester Hotel, in London‘s Mayfair, where rooms cost up to £3,000-a-night. Police said his bill topped £136,000 in just six months.

He also paid more than £22,000 to travel around the capital in a chauffeur-driven Rolls Royce and regularly visited Harrods, where he ‘scouted’ for victims and spent almost £68,000.

Ms Colbert spent three years trying to get back almost £44,000 she had loaned Watkin when she decided to take matters into her own hands in March 2024.

With the help of Watkin’s close friend, Hannah Jakes, 34, who was also defrauded of almost £100,000, she lured the fake millionaire, who was on the run from police, to a local pub with the promise of more cash.

Ms Colbert revealed how she wore a ‘large hat’ as a disguise and hid in someone else’s car in the car park of The Merlin public house, in Alderley Edge, Cheshire, so he would not recognise her.

But as soon as the unsuspecting Watkin arrived Ms Colbert swung into action and dialled 999. Minutes later detectives from Cheshire police swooped to arrest him.

After two major burglaries and the devastating fraud, Ms Colbert has had to take extraordinary measures to stay in business.

She explained: ‘I know they targeted me, and I know they were watching me, and they’re probably still watching me, and there could be other people with the same intentions watching me, so I’m really, really careful what I say in social media. 

‘I have to carry on trading, I sell luxury goods, but one of the biggest security measures I’ve made is the bags aren’t located at the shop now. 

‘I won’t tell anyone where they are. So it’s appointment only, there’s nothing on display in the shop itself, so there’s no point coming in to see a Hermes handbag. It’s not there.

‘We will only sell them now by appointment, so I’m hoping that’s the biggest deterrent.’

Ms Colbert says she never could have imagined this happening when she set up Dress Cheshire in 2018.

‘I honestly was opening a very quiet side hustle business. I’ve got a passion for luxury pre-owned handbags

‘I’m even now completely aware on how nervous I am to use my own. I wouldn’t walk down the street with a handbag now.

‘I get picked up at the door of my shop every single night. I don’t leave it. Where I live feels very safe as a community, but I don’t trust who’s watching anymore.

‘I’ve got a third-party security company now that just watches me leave, makes sure I don’t get marched back. It’s all cost a lot of money but I can’t take the risk for my own safety.

‘Although they didn’t target me personally, you do wonder how far these people would go to get what they want.’