A STUDENT who stole new chequebooks and credit cards from the postboxes of fellow residents in a block of flats has been jailed.

Bamidele Odunlami, aged 25, now of Wyatt Point, Thamesmead, was originally facing 24 charges when the case was set for trial in March.

However, last week he pleaded guilty to eight counts of theft, attempting to obtain goods by deception, handling a stolen chequebook, obtaining money by deception and being involved in obtaining money by deception, between November 30, 2004, and February 23 last year.

Blackfriars Crown Court heard computer student Odunlami rented a flat in Drake Point, a block of flats in Chichester Wharf on the Erith riverfront.

The postboxes for all the flats were located in a communal hallway and each resident had their own key to open their box.

But while other residents' keys only opened their own postbox, Odunlami had obtained a key which opened all the boxes.

In September 2004 a new Bank of Scotland chequebook was posted to Drake Point resident Francisco Brito-Diaz.

On November 30, the day before Mr Brito-Diaz reported the chequebook missing, Odunlami used one of the cheques to pay £550 into his own Woolwich bank account.

In January last year, a Saga Visa card belonging to another resident, Alec Tapper, was stolen by Odunlami who used it in Mr Tapper's name to try and buy a camera and a DVD mini-system online at Argos.

Prosecutor John Livingston said Odunlami gave a contact address in Camelot Close, Thamesmead, where he was also living, and gave a mobile phone number also belonging to him.

Again in January Alison Coggan, another resident, was surprised at her low funds when she went to get cash out of her Alliance and Leicester account, as she had her salary paid into the account.

When she queried this, she was told two cheques had been drawn from a chequebook she had not received, one for £1,000 and one for £1,500.

Mr Livingston said Ms Coggan's money was being channelled into a Nationwide Flex account in the name of Ali Imran.

Odunlami admitted handling the chequebook and police recovered it from Camelot Close.

A third cheque for £1,800, also payable to Ali Imran, had also been drawn on Ms Coggan's account.

The address given when the Nationwide account was opened was the flat in Drake Point which Odunlami was renting.

The mobile telephone contact number was the same one used for the attempted Argos transactions.

Mr Livingston said a police check with the Department for Work and Pensions failed to find any trace of Ali Imran.

For Odunlami, Gopal Hooper said his client shared the Drake Point flat with another man who had now disappeared. Odunlami claimed the man's younger brother was called Ali Imran.

Mr Hooper said Odunlami accepted his part in the thefts which totalled almost £9,000, but suggested his former flatmate was also involved.

He pleaded for a non-custodial sentence saying Odunlami was about to take his final exams in computer programming at Greenwich University and had saved £1,000 towards any compensation award.

Sentencing Odunlami to nine months in jail on each offence, to run concurrently, Judge David Martineau accused him of a "planned and premeditated thoroughly dishonest course of behaviour" and added: "Only a custodial sentence will do."

He ordered the remaining charges to remain on file.

Afterwards Mr Tapper said residents had spent more than five months unravelling Odunlami's activities in "a long and complex case".

He added: "It is sad a man with intellegence and talent has chosen to channel it in such an anti-social way."