A Sandy robber who climbed into an 85-year-old widower’s bedroom and took his wedding ring from his finger has been jailed for five years.

The victim – who lives with dementia – was in bed when Ronald Naidoo, 33, climbed in through the window and asked to see his wedding ring so he could “measure it”.

Naidoo, who had just days earlier robbed another house in the same road, was jailed for five years by a judge at Luton Crown Court on Thursday.

The serving prisoner entered guilty pleas before Judge Alan Greenwood by video link from Bedford prison.

Prosecutor Richard Hutchings told the court that on November 3 last year, Naidoo went to a house in Sandy’s Glebe Road and asked the inhabitant – a man in his 60s – for a glass of water.

He entered the house and, in a scuffle, snatched £30 from the man before fleeing.

Five days later, he carried out the ring burglary at another house in Glebe Road – also taking £65 from the 85-year-old victim’s bedside table before making off.

Naidoo, of St Swithuns Way, was arrested shortly after he entered the town’s branch of Barclays and tried to pay a stolen cheque for £867 into his own account in February this year.

The cheque had been stolen from a house in Gamlingay some months previously. It was not suggested that Naidoo had been responsible for taking it, but he tried to pay it into his account after the signature was forged.

Naidoo pleaded guilty to robbery, burglary and fraud by misrepresentation.

The court heard that at the time of Naidoo’s offending he and his wife were going through a divorce, and that his father had recently passed away.

Nick De Freitas said in mitigation that his client was “essentially going down a downward spiral”.

He said Naidoo had a longstanding heroin addiction and had taken the 85-year-old’s ring in an attempt to fund his drug use.