A 19-year-old professional thief who wrenched a £37,000 Patek Philippe watch from a Chinese academic’s wrist outside a Mayfair restaurant will be deported to Algeria upon his release from prison, a judge has ruled, describing him as a calculated and unremorseful offender who poses a high risk of reoffending.
Mohamed Sellaoui was convicted by a jury at Southwark Crown Court following a three-day trial, during which chemistry professor Jiangfeng Ni described being cornered by two men outside Langan’s Brasserie on 26 February 2024. Speaking through a Chinese interpreter, the professor from Soochow University told the court that the pair had pressed him into a corner, preventing him from moving, while one reached for the watch on his left wrist. “Both of them turned around and started running towards Green Park station,” he said. As he attempted to follow, one of the men fell but retained hold of the watch, while his accomplice swung a punch at the professor to buy time for his partner to flee. “He was waving his fist and making ‘woo woo’ noises,” Mr Ni told the jury. “My mind went blank. In my head, I had to ask myself: ‘What happened?'”
In a victim impact statement, Mr Ni said he had not been physically hurt but that the experience had profoundly altered his relationship with London. “Now when someone comes close to me, I feel very nervous,” he said. The watch, which he had purchased years earlier, held considerable sentimental value. “It has changed his feelings towards London,” prosecutor Lynn Fanshawe told the court.
The attack was not opportunistic. Sentencing Judge Gregory Perrins told Sellaoui that the victim had clearly been identified as a target in advance — whether by Sellaoui himself or on instruction from another party. “Either way it was plainly a planned offence,” the judge said. He also noted that Sellaoui had been on bail at the time of the robbery for a separate theft — stealing a rucksack containing laptops, an iPhone and other items worth £2,000 from a diner at a West End restaurant on 2 February 2023, an offence to which he later pleaded guilty.
The judge was unsparing in his assessment of the defendant. “Despite your young age you are plainly a professional thief,” he told Sellaoui. “You have shown no remorse and no real responsibility for your actions and you are at a high risk of reoffending.” He noted that Sellaoui was in the country illegally, had no lawful means of supporting himself and had no meaningful ties to the United Kingdom. He will be deported to Algeria once his custodial sentence has been served.
Sellaoui had denied the robbery charge throughout his trial, with the assistance of an Arabic interpreter, but was found guilty by the jury.
