A Newham man has admitted his part in a £1.3m ATM cash point spree which took place over a single weekend.

Teofil Bortos, 36, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud at the Old Bailey yesterday. Bortos was part of an eastern European criminal gang which hacked into 51 cash machines over the 2014 May bank holiday.

The group targeted the ATMs by inserting malware into them, subsequently removing hundreds of thousands of pounds from them.

All were in public places in cities and towns, including London, Brighton, Portsmouth, Blackpool, Doncaster, Liverpool and Sheffield.

Bortos, a Romaninan national, was arrested in July 2015 at Luton Airport by the investigation team and remanded in custody where he has been awaiting trial.

“The evidence gathered by the London Regional Fraud Team [LRFT] points towards a highly sophisticated and organised attack on UK cash machines committed by an eastern European crime network, which has today been further reinforced by the guilty plea of Teofil Bortos,” said Det Insp Matt Mountford, head of the LRFT.

“His conviction sends out a clear message that this type of criminality will be pursued and dismantled, no matter how it is committed and where those responsible come from.”

Bortos’ plea at the Old Bailey comes ten months after Grigore Paladi was jailed for five years for similar offences following an LRFT investigation.

Bortos is due to be sentenced at the Old Bailey on January 11.