Three members of a gang have been jailed for their part in the UK’s biggest burglary spree, a £26m series of raids on celebrity homes likened to a Hollywood movie.

Italian nationals Jugoslav Jovanovic, 24, Alessandro Maltese, 45, and Alessandro Donati, 44, stole £26m of cash, jewellery and gems in 13 days in December 2019.

The victims included the former England footballer Frank Lampard and his TV presenter wife Christine, who said they have had trouble sleeping after £60,000 of watches and jewellery were stolen from their Chelsea home while they were away.

In an impact statement, Lampard said the raid had had a “major impact” on his general feeling of security. “Neither Christine nor I are sleeping too well as a consequence of this incident,” he said.

The biggest burglary of the spree was a £25m raid on the Kensington home of the socialite Tamara Ecclestone, while she was in Lapland. The 37-year-old daughter of the former motor racing supremo, Bernie Ecclestone, said the raid left her “scared” and “obsessing over security”.

Prosecutor Timothy Cray QC said: “The plots are comparable to what you would see in a Hollywood movie but unfortunately this was real life, involving real victims who have suffered greatly by their actions.”

The gang also targeted the Knightsbridge home of the tycoon and late Leicester City owner Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha.

Police said the gang were believed to have carried out similar crimes against high-profile victims across Europe and had planned to commit further raids in the UK.

Detectives have not revealed the identities of other potential victims.

Jovanovic, Maltese and Donati were extradited from Italy and pleaded guilty to conspiracy to burgle between 29 November and 18 December 2019 over the three raids.

They were caught after police trawled through thousands of hours of CCTV footage and tracked down more than 1,000 taxi drivers operating at the time of the raids. The 1,004th taxi driver contacted confirmed he had picked them up.

Another breakthrough came when, on a hunch, a detective asked to see the records of guests staying at a south London hotel at the time of the burglaries.

One of the burglars, Jovanovic, 24, had used his identity card to check in, with the image identical to the man police were looking for.

Metropolitan police DC Andrew Payne said the gang was so amazed to have been caught that they praised the officers for finding them. “They believed they were untouchable,” he said.

Jovanovic also admitted conspiracy to commit money laundering between 10 December 2019 and 31 January last year, and one count of attempting to convert criminal property.

He was jailed for 11 years by Judge Martin Edmunds QC at Isleworth crown court on Monday, while Maltese and Donati were each sentenced to eight years and nine months in prison.

The men will return to Italy to serve their sentences after proceeds of crime proceedings in the UK.

The judge told them: “The fact that each burglary was accomplished despite the precautions of the householders, that so much was stolen and then, it is to be inferred, removed from the country and not recovered speaks to the overall organisation, planning and criminal determination, together with a willingness to take chances.

“You did so in the hope of substantial gain for yourselves but regardless of the loss to those people – not only of objects of financial value but of objects of deep personal significance and of the sense of safety and security that anyone is entitled to feel in their own home.”

The judge said the gang had chosen their targets because of the celebrity of their occupiers, adding: “The distress caused by the burglary of a home of householders who may be well known or wealthy is no less than that caused to those in different circumstances.”

A fourth member of the gang, Daniel Vukovic, 44, believed to be a Serbian national who uses a string of aliases, fled to Belgrade, where he was the subject of a failed attempt at extradition in the summer.

Only a handful of items have been recovered, with the rest of the valuables believed to have been taken abroad.

“It’s buried treasure somewhere, globally,” said Payne.