Prosecutor Julian Christopher KC told the court that a gang of five in two vehicles drove through locked gates of Blenheim Palace in the early hours of 14 September 2019 and smashed their way into the building with sledgehammers.

The court heard that the sledgehammers were left at the scene.

A photograph was taken about 17 hours before the toilet was stolen and Mr Christopher told the court that Mr Jones had taken it while he was “there as part of the reconnaissance for the burglary”.

Mr Christopher told the court the raid took just five minutes.

He added: “The work of art was never recovered. It appears to have been split up into smaller amounts of gold and never recovered.”

A fourth man, James Sheen, 40, from Wellingborough in Northamptonshire, pleaded guilty to burglary, transferring criminal property and conspiracy to do the same in April 2024, jurors were told.

Entitled America, the 18-carat gold toilet was part of an exhibition by Italian conceptual artist Maurizio Cattelan.

It weighed 98kg and was insured for $6m. Gold prices at the time would have seen the gold alone worth £2.8m in September 2019, the court was told.

The prosecutor said a series of messages, voice notes and screengrabs discovered on Mr Sheen, Mr Doe and Mr Guccuk’s phones showed the trio negotiated a price of £25,632 per kilo for around 20kg of the stolen gold.

It was claimed Mr Guccuk, who ran the jewellers Pacha of London in Hatton Garden, would make a profit of about £3,000 for every kilo he sold on.

The palace is a Unesco World Heritage Site and was the birthplace of Sir Winston Churchill.

The trial continues.