A serial robber who threatened to decapitate Songs of Praise presenter Aled Jones and left a Bridgerton actress traumatised has pleaded guilty to a further machete robbery, with a judge warning him a “substantial custodial sentence” awaits when he is sentenced in June.
Zacariah Boulares, now 19, from Feltham, south London, appeared at Southwark Crown Court on Thursday and admitted attempting to steal a Rolex watch from Neil Tallantire outside a Waitrose in Porchester Road, Bayswater, on 19 August 2023, while armed with a machete. The attack took place in broad daylight, was captured on CCTV, and occurred just six weeks after he had robbed Jones at knifepoint.
Judge Mark Weekes questioned why it had taken two and a half years to bring the case to court despite clear CCTV footage and Boulares having spent time in custody during that period. He ordered the Crown Prosecution Service and Metropolitan Police to provide a full explanation by 9 April, saying the victim “must be bewildered about what’s taken quite so long.”
Boulares had been 16 when he targeted Jones on Chiswick High Road, trailing the Welsh baritone before producing a machete and demanding his £17,000 Daytona Rolex. When Jones followed him at a distance afterwards, Boulares warned him to “walk the other way or I will cut your head off.”
In February last year he was caught attempting to steal an iPhone from Bridgerton actress Genevieve Chenneour at a branch of Joe and the Juice on Kensington High Street. Chenneour, who played Clara Livingston in the Netflix series, tackled him to the ground and retrieved her phone, striking him with it repeatedly. Her then boyfriend, scriptwriter Carlo Kureishi, who was threatened with being stabbed, helped pin Boulares down. Chenneour later said the trauma had led her to consider leaving London entirely.
Boulares has accumulated 12 convictions for 28 offences including violence, weapon possession and theft. At an earlier sentencing in July 2025, a judge described him as targeting wealthy areas for “rich pickings” in a systematic pattern of theft from restaurant and café customers, adding: “You seem to be plagued by an attitude that if people can afford nice things, then you can take them.”
The court has ordered psychological and psychiatric reports ahead of sentencing on 19 June, with the judge also set to consider a finding of dangerousness. Boulares claims to suffer from autism and possibly ADHD.
