A BURGLAR who targeted a Lower Earley home while a family slept inside has been jailed.

David Basden, 33, from King's Road in Reading, was jailed for four years at Reading Crown Court yesterday after pleading guilty to burgling the house in Paddick Drive between November 24 and November 25 last year.

He stole electrical items, including iPads and laptops, worth �2,000 while the family, including young children, slept upstairs. Basden was arrested on November 25 on an unrelated matter and had some of the stolen property with him at the time, while the rest of the loot was found at his house.

Basden was also sentenced to 18 months for handling stolen goods from a separate burglary at Heron Island in Caversham on October 17, where he took electrical items worth �1,000 and sold some of them on to a second-hand store.

PC Chris Susel, who led the investigation, said "Burglaries of this type have a devastating effect on victims, especially those families with young children.

"This was a justified sentence for offences of this kind, and one which those who commit such crimes can expect."