A STUDENT and a semi-professional footballer have been jailed for a total of 10 years for robbing a 75-year-old man of £5,000 cash before going to buy designer clothes.
Rishi Nankani, 25 of Edith Road, Selhurst and Daniel Emifeoluwa, 23, of Goldwell Road, Thornton Heath, were both found guilty of robbing the man outside the Post Office in London Road on October 16 last year.
They were found guilty at Croydon Crown Court on October 31, with Nankani, who has played for a number of clubs in the south east, including Carshalton Athletic, jailed for six years and Emifeoluwa for four.
The court heard the duo stole the cash by pushing the pensioner over in the street and dragging him into oncoming traffic to take a bag containing £5,000, meant to pay for building work.
Witnesses said they saw them flee the scene at speed in a silver Range Rover.
Nankani had watched the victim withdraw the cash earlier that day at a bank, and was caught on CCTV footage there, wearing a distinctive deerstalker hat.
When police visited his address they found him with a set of keys for a silver Range Rover, parked nearby. They also found a wad of £50 notes totaling £2,000 hidden in a grey jacket in his wardrobe, a deerstalker hat matching the one seen in the CCTV footage, as well as a receipt for a Versace jumper purchased at a Croydon shopping centre earlier that day.
CCTV footage from the shopping centre showed Nankani shopping alongside Emifeoluwa.
Detective Constable Leigh Stimpson, from Croydon CID, who investigated the case, said:"Nankani and Emifeoluwa worked together to pick out and target their elderly victim. It took them almost no time at all to go and start spending the money they'd stolen, but ultimately, this ended up helping us with the investigation.
"The witness accounts, CCTV footage from the bank and shopping centre and evidence recovered from the car and Nankani's address all helped to prove that they were responsible for this robbery."
The pair were also each ordered to pay £2,500 compensation to repay the victim.
