A “wicked” career criminal who committed 26 offences of burglary, forgery and theft in the space of a single month — including stealing cash from a church and a man’s disability allowance — was sent down for 12 years.

Heroin addict Stephen Andre Wilson, 47, was described by Puisne Judge Carlisle Greaves as having the ability to “speak like Jesus” when explaining away his numerous crimes but whose premeditated actions actually demonstrated “a wicked mind”.

Supreme Court heard that Wilson, of no fixed abode, carried out a crime spree between July 22 and August 23 last year which included breaking into the office of the Roman Catholic diocese of Bermuda, on Astwood Road, Paget, and taking two pre-signed cheques and $240 cash.

Wilson, who had spotted the chequebook a few days earlier when collecting payment for a painting job at the church, later tried to cash one of the cheques for $2,400.

On August 1 he asked an acquaintance, Joseph Ascento, to cash a cheque for him in Lindo’s in Devonshire. When Mr. Ascento came out and told him the attempt had failed, Wilson grabbed his disability cheque from his hand and rode away on a motorbike.

Other offences committed by Wilson included breaking into a family home where he had done painting work in Smith’s and stealing 11 watches worth $37,300, taking stock worth almost $41,500 from a motorcycle shop’s storeroom and stealing a distinctive child’s knapsack from an apartment, which he was carrying when finally arrested.

Police also discovered a notebook on his person entitled “Serious Confession by Andre Wilson of Crimes of Breaking, Entering, Stealing and Forging Checks” which detailed most of the 26 offences.

Mr. Justice Greaves said the written confession and the repeated theft of large sums of money and valuable goods day after day were not the actions of a drug addict desperate for his next fix.

“That’s not a sign of drug addiction, that’s a sign of wickedness,” he said. “How could you be so high needing drugs so bad that you had time to sit down (and) write a big long confession in case you got caught? It doesn’t fool me. It demonstrates in my opinion a wicked mind.”

The judge predicted that Wilson would “stand there and he will lay his head on one side and he will speak so sweetly and the tears will come down”. He said: “He’s good at these things.”

Wilson admitted ten dwelling burglaries, one other burglary, five forgeries, three thefts and seven counts of using a false instrument. He asked for 14 other offences to be taken into account.

He told the judge his son was involved in a freak motorcycle accident in 2004 and he “literally watched him die”.

“It was devastating to me,” said Wilson. “I can’t even put into words the effect that it had on me. As you know I have been fighting the ills of heroin for quite a long time and like a fool I reverted to that drug as a means to escape the pain that overwhelmed me by going through that ordeal down at the hospital.”

Mr. Justice Greaves suggested that Wilson had not brought the boy up himself and that he had told a similar tale of grief concerning the death of his father on countless occasions in court. “I’m very sorry to hear your son has passed away but you know I have heard these exact words several times before in relation to your father.”

Wilson, who admitted he had an “atrocious” criminal record, told him: “I don’t consider myself to be a bad person trying to become good but rather a sick person trying to get well.”

But the judge replied: “It’s so easy to pick apart what you are saying it’s not even funny.”

To defence attorney Shade Subair’s submission that her client be given a combined custodial and community sentence, including long-term residential drug treatment, Mr. Justice Greaves said: “There are no treatment facilities in Bermuda that can handle Mr. Wilson. They will learn very quickly that Mr. Wilson is much brighter than they are. He has had more chances than the owner of a lottery.”

He sentenced him to six years for the burglaries, three years for the thefts and three years for the forgeries, to run consecutively.