After undertaking some petty crime and spending time in HMP Wormwood Scrubs and Borstal for theft (from which he escaped and was eventually caught and sent to Reading Prison), he spent six weeks of the required two years doing National Service in the British Army, before running away to return to petty crime. Sentenced to three years in 1952 for breaking and entering, he was sent to the juvenile wing of Wandsworth Prison in London. He then graduated to jewellery theft from large country houses.