London: Two of the ringleaders of the Hatton Garden heist yesterday thanked the judge as he jailed them for an audacious £14million gem raid that he said stood ‘in a class of its own,’ reports Daily Mail.

‘Diamond wheezers’ Terry Perkins, 67, said ‘thank you sir’ and Daniel Jones, 61, ‘thank you judge’ as the pair were each sentenced to seven years in prison along with fellow ringleader John ‘Kenny’ Collins, 75.

Judge Christopher Kinch QC sentenced six of the seven members of the gang – who have a combined age of 448 – to a total of 34 years in jail yesterday.

He said: ‘The burglary of the Hatton Garden Safe Deposit vault in April 2015 has been labelled by many as the biggest burglary in English legal history.

‘Whether that assertion is capable of proof, I do not know. However, it is clear that the burglary at the heart of this case stands in a class of its own in the scale of the ambition, the detail of the planning, the level of preparation and the organization of the team carrying it out, and in terms of the value of the Quartermaster William ‘Billy the Fish’ Lincoln, 60, also got seven years while Carl Wood, 59, who quit the gang halfway through the raid, got six years. Hugh Doyle, 49, who allowed the group to use his office, got a suspended term.

The group’s oldest member Brian Reader, 77, of Dartford, was also due to be sentenced today but, after falling ill in Belmarsh and having a second stroke, he was deemed unfit to appear in the dock alongside his accomplices. Another thief, known only as Basil, remains at large.

Earlier today footage of the unearthing of the gems was released as six of the veteran criminals involved in the Hatton Garden heist were jailed. Police uncovered a Sainsbury’s Bag-for-Life stuffed with jewellery and gems stolen in the raid – after it was buried beneath a gravestone by one of the gang.