A gang member involved in a smash and grab raid on a jewellers at Bluewater shopping centre has been jailed for five-and-a-half years.

Joe Tomlinson (pictured below), 27, is the second to be sentenced for aggravated burglary at Goldsmiths. Two others have so far escaped arrest.

Maidstone Crown Court heard how, wearing balaclavas, they smashed their way into the closed shop with sledgehammers in the late evening of June 28 this year.

They broke open a display cabinet and stole over £50,000 worth of valuables, including Tag Heuer watches worth over £41,000 and three Cartier watches worth £8,225.

Extensive damage was caused. A security guard rushed to the scene but retreated after being warned to stay back.

The gang drove off in a Volvo estate car and sped onto the A2, before being chased into Bexley by police.

The getaway driver rammed the police car twice in an attempt to escape.

Three of the men fled. Police dog Windsor tracked the other, David Mays, 29, to where he was hiding in a bush and took a chunk out of his leg.

Mays, of Chessington Avenue, Bexleyheath, was later jailed for five years after admitting the charge.

Both Mays and Tomlinson, of Ryston Close, Islington, north London, were on licence for other offences at the time of the raid.

Judge Philip Statman said on Tuesday it was pre-planned, serious organised crime.

Tomlinson's record was more serious than Mays, having been jailed for five years in October 2005 for a stabbing and serving prison sentences for burglary.

Tomlinson, who also admitted the offence, was said to have become involved because his ex-girlfriend had threatened to withdraw contact with their child over unpaid maintenance.

"In taking the risk you did to commit this offence, it seems to me you have shown a very considerable defect in your powers of reasoning," the judge told him.