Burglar racks up his 250th conviction A career thief who has notched up 250 convictions in 50 years was behind bars again last night. Simon Berkowitz was sentenced to five-and-a-half years after admitting several counts of burglary and other charges. The 65-year-old, who was implicated in stealing notes detailing the former Liberal Democrat leader Paddy Ashdown's affair with a secretary in 1992, confessed to five burglaries, going equipped to burgle and two counts of fraud in the New Forest area of Hampshire that netted £30,000.