'World's unluckiest burglars' arrested after pocket-dialling police during robbery

Two hapless burglars have been arrested in the UK after accidentally pocket-dialling the police during their crime.

An officer in Staffordshire, central England, labelled the thieves the "world's unluckiest burglars" and likened them to the ill-fated crooks in the movie Home Alone.

He said one of the pair mistakenly sat on his phone and rang 999, the UK's emergency number, allowing officers to hear the crime in progress and ultimately listen in on their colleagues arresting the duo.

"I think we have just arrested the world's unluckiest burglars," Chief Inspector John Owen wrote on Twitter.

"Whilst committing a burglary one of the bungling burglars has accidentally sat on his phone & dialled 999," he wrote.

"We (received) a call detailing all of their antics up to the point of hearing our patrols arrive to arrest them."

Adding insult to injury, Chief Insp. Owen included a gif of the "Home Alone" character Marv, who proves comically unsuited to a life of crime in the Macaulay Culkin Christmas movie.

In 2016, two equally unfortunate robbers held up a McDonald's in France -- only to discover that 11 armed members of an elite paramilitary force happened to be eating inside.