A MOTHER has spoken of the trauma suffered by her family after they were plagued by an underwear thief.

Lingerie belonging to Leanne Burrell and her 13-year-old daughter began to go missing last summer.

But it was not until May that she realised someone had been stealing from them when she found the front of her swimming costume, the bra straps and the crotch area of her daughter’s boxer shorts cut out in her garden.

Mrs Burrell, of Melody Road, Biggin Hill, said: “Suddenly it dawned on me it had been happening for ages. There had been lots of things going missing, I hadn’t worked it out until that day.”

She believes the thefts started when her daughter’s new bikini went missing from the washing line.

The 40-year-old said: “We bought another and that went missing too. I put it down to me being scatty, but time went on and bits and pieces continued to go missing.”

News Shopper: Paul and Leanne Burrell

One day Mrs Burrell says she hung out 32 items of clothing only to find just 16 remaining the next day.

The fear of what was happening to the family even forced her to take her two children and stay at a friend’s house.

Mrs Burrell said: “I didn’t know if the person was playing some sexual game, I was really scared.

“I had to have all the windows closed.

“When I was in bed at night I had visions of someone putting on our clothes and coming up to the windows.”

She added: “One day I didn’t go to work I was too stressed out.

“At one point I just wanted to move.”

Last week Luke Wicker, aged 20, was given a four month prison sentence suspended for 12 months at Bromley Magistrates’ Court after he pleaded guilty to four counts of theft relating to the Burrells’ clothing.

Police found 65 items behind his bed at his then home in Whitby Close, Biggin Hill, including 15 bras, 26 knickers and a pair of tights, most of which belonged to Mrs Burrell’s daughter.

News Shopper: Underwear thief Luke Wicker caught on CCTV

Magistrates heard that shortly after midnight, Wicker would climb over the Burrells’ fence and into their back garden where he would remove clothes from the family’s washing line before stuffing them down his pants.

The family captured Wicker on CCTV and performed a citizen’s arrest when they encountered him in the street shortly after.

Wicker, who has now moved to the Sussex area, was also given a 100 hours community payback sentence, a restraining order not to contact the Burrells or to go to their home and to pay them £250 compensation.

Mrs Burrell, a housing association worker, says his sentence does not adequately compensate the family for the stress and fear they suffered.

She said: “I think it will stay with us, for example every time I go to buy knickers.

“The more I think about what happened, the more I feel maddened and sickened by the whole thing.”