Five men are beginning a total of 23 and a half years behind bars today after their crime spree ended in a dramatic car chase along the M6 and through the Black Country.

The conviction follows a string of commercial robberies across three police force areas between August 2011 and January 2012. The men, all from Wolverhampton, were arrested after a raid on the Murco Petrol Station in Warstones Road, Wolverhampton in the early hours of Friday 13 January this year.

The raids, across West Mercia, West Midlands and Staffordshire police areas, were linked after a distinctive white Audi RS5 was spotted or captured on CCTV at each crime scene, bearing false number plates.

The car, worth £85,000 and one of only two of that particular specification in the country, had been stolen from Stourport-on-Seven on 3 August 2011.

On Friday 13 January police were alerted to an attempted robbery of the ATM machine at the Murco garage. The distinctive RS5 was again spotted, although it had by now been resprayed black.

Police gave chase but were forced to halt their pursuit as the car reached a staggering 180 miles per hour on the M6 motorway.

The police helicopter took up the chase as they doubled back at junction 13 and attempted to exit at junction 12. A police stinger didn't deter them as the gang did a u-turn on the exit sliproad and went back onto the M6 the wrong way, doing a handbrake turn to set them southbound again to leave at Hilton Park services.

The car was eventually abandoned at a block of flats in Pickering Road, Wednesfield, where police dogs tracked the offenders into the flats and they were arrested