A burglar who criss-crossed England and Wales raiding hundreds of churches in a nine-month spree has been jailed for four years.

Christopher Coulthard, 40, sized up his targets dressed as a tourist and even carried his tools in a camera bag.

Among his victims were churches across North Yorkshire.

Coulthard was carrying £2,450 in cash when he was eventually caught. He drove a car bought for £1,900 with the proceeds of crime, Swansea Crown Court heard yesterday.

But despite being a one- man crime wave, carrying out an average of two break-ins a day, the vast majority of his offences went undetected, the court was told.

He covered his tracks by throwing away shoes he wore during break-ins and carried a duster to wipe away fingerprints.

But after his arrest, Coulthard made a "full and frank" confession and later advised the police on how to improve church security.

He was caught in Aberystwyth, west Wales, in September after a local cleric who had become suspicious reported him to the police.

Coulthard admitted 15 cases of burglary and one of attempted burglary and asked for 502 others to be taken into account.

The court heard that he targeted charity boxes and broke into safes, but many break-ins were so well planned nobody knew he had ever been there.

James Jenkins, defending, said: "If you want to see it in religious terms, he has made a good confession."

Catherine Richards, prosecuting, said Coult-hard targeted churches in North Yorkshire, the Midlands, Gloucester, Herefordshire, East Anglia, Devon, Cornwall and Wales.

He travelled from town to town, staying in small hotels and visiting churches marked on Ordinance Survey maps, to case them in advance.

Judge Manning-Davies said reports showed Coulthard had been a burglar since he was 13.

He jailed him for four years for the 15 separate break-ins and for two years, to run concurrently, for an attempted break-in.