A hoax car bomb alert was set up by thieves to burgle a row of Belfast houses early today.
Homes in the Cumberland Road area of Dundonald in the east of the city were evacuated for several hours after the suspect stolen car was abandoned in the street.
When the alert was declared to be bogus by army bomb disposal experts families were allowed to return to their homes - only to find they had been ransacked and robbed.
While police had blocked off the street, the robbers had got into the back of houses from open land behind.
Eight neighbouring homes were hit and the occupants lost cash, jewellery and other items.
Police are convinced the bomb alert was specifically set up to force the evacuation of the houses that backed onto the open land. Local police chief Chief Inspector Stephen Adley said the whole thing had been well planned.
"He said: "This was clearly pre-planned and we are led to believe - though our investigations are at an early stage - they knew where they were targeting, they knew the residents who were living in those properties and they also knew the backs of those properties were exposed to open land.