by Two men will be sentenced for their part in a robbery at the home of Olympic cyclist Mark Cavendish, who was threatened at knifepoint.
Balaclava-clad intruders broke into the 37-year-old’s home as he slept upstairs with his wife Peta in Ongar, Essex, a trial at Chelmsford Crown Court had previously reported.
Ms Cavendish said she covered the couple’s three-year-old son, who was also in bed, with a duvet so they couldn’t see what was happening.
Two Richard Mille watches, valued at £400,000 and £300,000, were among the items taken in the raid around 2:30am on November 27, 2021.
Romario Henry, 31, of Bell Green, Lewisham, south-east London, denied two counts of theft but a jury found him guilty on both counts.
Ali Sesay, 28, of Holding Street, Rainham, Kent, admitted to two counts of theft.
Sesay’s DNA was found on Peta Cavendish’s phone, which was also stolen and later found outside the property, the trial said.
The charges were that the defendant robbed Mr. Cavendish of a watch, a telephone and a safe, and his wife a watch, a telephone and a suitcase.
Henry and Sesay, who have been remanded, are due to appear at Chelmsford Crown Court, where they will be sentenced by Judge David Turner KC, on Tuesday.
Ms Cavendish, who, like her husband, was naked during the robbery, told jurors that she was woken in the night by a noise and went downstairs to investigate.
He saw “figures of men wearing ski masks and running towards the bottom of the stairs”, and said he believes there were “between three and five” of them.
She ran back to her bedroom, yelling “get back” or “get in” to her husband, who failed to activate a panic alarm.
She told the trial that one of the intruders “dragged” Mr Cavendish “by the feet and started beating him”.
One had her husband in a headlock, she said, adding: “One of them put a big black knife to her throat and said, ‘Where are the watches?’ and, ‘Do you want me to stab you?’”
She agreed with the suggestion that it was a Rambo-style knife while, in his testimony, Mr Cavendish said that it was “not a knife you have in a kitchen”.
“It was black and it had holes in it,” he said, adding: “It was a weapon.”
Jurors were told two other men, Jo Jobson, from Plaistow, east London, and George Goddard, from Loughton in Essex, have been named as suspects in the case but not arrested.
Jobson was 25 and Goddard 26 at the time of a police appeal last March.
Oludewa Okorosobo, 28, of Flaxman Road, Camberwell, south London, denied two counts of theft and was acquitted by the jury after a trial.
