gas meter bandit

plural gas meter bandits

1. BritishslangA small-time thief.

   Fucking gas-meter bandits, thought Billy. Some fucking gang. I'm stuck with a couple of gas-meter bandits. Stan and his nagging missus. His non-existent job that he's never late for.

   2011, Jake Arnott, He Kills Coppers

   2 more examples

   We might not have had that much to pinch, but they'd still have your brass candlesticks off the mantelpiece. There's always wrong 'uns, in every walk of life, who'll have whatever you've got from under your nose. Bloody gas-meter bandits, […]

   2000, Gilda O'Neill, My East End: Memories of Life in Cockney London

   At the lowest end of the scale are petty criminals, shoplifters, sneak thieves, joyriders, muggers (or 'street robbers', as they are now called) and gas-meter bandits. Up a step are burglars, car thieves, fraudsters and drug dealers.

   2011, Razor Smith, A Rusty Gun