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Members of an Italian clan of burglars who took over £1.2m worth of items, among them from former NUFC forward Alexander Isak, have been mandated to pay back only £1 per person.

Brothers Valentino and Giacomo, their female sibling Jela and her son Charlie Jovanovic journeyed to the northeastern of England to burgle multiple homes in April 2024.

The group of four were imprisoned for between six and 10 years in May 2025.

At a proceeds of crime proceeding at the court, Jela Jovanovic and the brothers Nikolov were instructed to pay back £1 each while Charlie must hand over over a thousand pounds.

Details of the Break-ins

The judge was told the group arrived by ferry in the UK on 27 March 2024 and employed a RV as their "base of operations", which they parked at Scotch Corner and Durham service service stations while using another car to scout out targets and carry out burglaries.

On 31 March they stole over one million pounds of items including designer clothing, purses, jewellery and a honor from a residence on a street in Jesmond, Newcastle, while the owners were on holiday.

The next evening, the crew entered a home on a private road in Whitburn, and stole designer handbags, jewellery and shoes valued at over £100,000.

Following surveillance of Newcastle United's training ground for 48 hours, they then acted at the home of Swedish player Mr Isak in Darras Hall, Ponteland on April 4, stealing £10,000 in money, £68,000 worth of jewellery and the player's one hundred twenty thousand pound luxury car.

The gang, who were portrayed by prosecutors as experienced itinerant thieves, wore gloves and masks, turned their phones on silent as they neared their objectives and attached a license plate, which had been stolen from a garage in Chester-le-Street, on to their vehicle with rubber straps.

They were arrested in the Birmingham on April 13.

Court Hearings and Rulings

Valentino had pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to burglary but was found guilty by jurors, while his family members had all submitted admissions to the same charge.

At the criminal gains session, prosecutor Daniel Cordey said every one of the burglars had profited from their crimes to the value of £1,266,285.93, which was based on what the affected parties said they had had stolen.

But Charlie was the only one deemed to have any funds that could be "realised", specifically over a thousand pounds which had already been seized by police, the judge heard, with two weeks to be spent in jail if he defaulted.

The remaining members had no assets or property so were ordered to make a nominal fee of £1 each, with seven days in incarceration the consequence if the money was not paid.

Judge Spragg said if they were found with assets in the coming years, "for example driving around Italy in a sports car or owning a property", prosecutors could seek new proceedings to "recover the sum due".