Revealed: Godfather Adams' £500,000 Aladdin's cave of stolen art and antiques

Officers seized £500,000 worth of missing art and antiques after arresting Terry Adams on charges of money laundering.

The 52-year-old was later jailed following a ten-year investigation into his £200million criminal empire.

Most of the loot at his £2million North London mansion was stolen from country houses, art galleries and museums.

Police say the treasures were about to be moved when they swooped in September 2003. The haul included Henry Moore prints and Picasso etchings worth £35,000 that had been stolen from a London gallery in 1997.

Officers also found five pieces of Meissen porcelain worth £120,000 and a pair of blue john cassolette vases worth £60,000. These were later traced back to Asprey's auction house. The haul was made public by officers following the return of the last of the stolen pieces to their owners.

Among the victims of the burglaries was an 85-year-old woman from Sherborne in Dorset, whose £2,000 lacquered Davenport writing bureau was stolen in 1992.

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The woman, who did not want to be named, said: "By the time the police found it, the insurance company had paid out on it. It is now in their possession and I don't think I can afford to buy it back, which is a shame."

A list of the items – stolen over a period of ten to 15 years – was sent to experts at the Art Loss Register. They were able to match some of them to entries on their database of 170,000 items of stolen art and antiques.

During his trial at the Old Bailey the jury was told how Adams enjoyed a lavish lifestyle funded by his illicit activities. Linked with anything up to 25 murders he has never been given a substantial jail term because witnesses are too scared to testify against him.

His last known criminal offence was in 1992 and he had ruled by terror since he was a teenager.

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Those brave enough to oppose him have been kneecapped, "opened up like a bag of crisps" or simply wiped out, the court was told.

The father-of-one made so much money from running the so-called "A team" Adams family that he was able to retire at 35.

He considered himself "above the law" and "played the system" to make it almost impossible to bring him to justice, the court heard.

But after decades of racketeering he was finally caught after the Inland Revenue investigated his lavish lifestyle in the mid-1990s.

He offered to settle for £95,000 in 1996 but the National Crime Squad – now the Serious and Organised Crime Agency – launched a £50million probe with support from MI5.

A specialist team bugged his home – Fallowfield in Mill Hill – to prove he lived off the proceeds of crime.

After a succession of delays he finally pleaded guilty to money laundering in March and was given seven years.