A KEMBLE man whose home was an 'Aladdin's cave' of valuable stolen goods was jailed for fifteen months today.

Daniel Ritchings, 40, of Malmesbury Road, Kemble, was told by Judge William Hart that he had been a 'regular receiver of stolen goods.'

"You were a reliable fence for stolen goods from across the country," said the judge at Gloucester Crown Court.

"It is the existence of people like you, who are prepared to receive stolen goods, that promotes burglary and theft."

Sitting alongside Ritchings in the dock was his partner Rebecca Webb, 28, who had been drawn into his offending by agreeing to market stolen goods on eBay.

She wept as Ritchings received his jail term and he kissed her goodbye before going down to the cells.

Webb, of the same address, was spared prison. Judge Hart sentenced her to a 12 months community order with 140 hours of unpaid work after telling her that her offending was far less serious.

The couple had denied a total of seven charges of handling the stolen property between December 2012 and January 2013.

But after a three day trial in May a jury of seven women and five men found Ritchings guilty of all five charges he faced. Webb was convicted of handling a collection of stolen chainsaws and trimmers and also of handling stolen perfume but was cleared of handling a stolen car and two bikes.

The expensive mountain bikes had been stolen from their owners in Cheltenham and were found among the property in the couple's house, said prosecutor Julian Kesner.

He said thousands of pounds worth of top end perfume taken from a pharmacy in Leicestershire was also found - along with chain saws and hedge trimmers stolen from the George Cann Garden Machinery firm in Hampshire.

A stolen VW Scirocco was also at the premises and had been fitted with false number plates, added Mr Kesner.

He said Ritchings was "not particular who he bought from nor what he sold."

The police raid was on January 16, 2013 The perfumes had been taken from the Mistry Pharmacy in Leicestershire, he said. The VW Scirocco was stolen from Duncan Rhodes two years earlier.

One of the mountain bikes, a Rocky worth £2,000, had been stolen from Elliott Caunce of Cheltenham and the other was stolen from owner Sam Mitchell's workplace in the town. Ritchings told police he had paid someone from Cheltenham £1,500 for the pair.

Jon Holmes, for Ritchings, urged the court today to pass a suspended jail term. He said the offending had been a long time ago and Ritchings had moved on with his life and had qualified as an MoT inspector and was now running his father's garage business.

For Webb, Dermot Clarke said she now had work looking after dogs five days a week, five hours a day. Judge Hart interrupted to say he did not need to hear from Mr Clarke because he was prepared to follow the recommendation in her pre-sentence report.

Passing sentence, the judge commented that the stolen car and the chainsaw and trimmer equipment had come into Ritchings' possession very soon after they were taken.

The perfume went virtually straight to Ritchings after being stolen, he said.

"You gave an account of your willingness to buy what were obviously stolen items from people in vans full of such equipment and the speed with which they came to you shows completely that you had become a regular receiver of stolen goods."