David Patmore, 32, had rammed police drivers who were trying to intercept him in Harpurhey, north Manchester, and drove at more than 70mph in the dark with his lights off in a bid to escape.
He crashed into two cars before abandoning the stolen Audi Q3, ran into the grounds of a church and hid up a tree.
Richard Bennett, prosecuting, told Teesside Crown Court (above) that police dogs tracked Patmore to the tree, from where officers heard him call an associate with instructions.
Before he came down, he tried to "smash his phone to bits" to prevent detectives accessing the data, Mr Bennett said.
"He shouted 'I'll be down in a minute - I just don't want you to have my phone'," the barrister said.
Patmore, of Frankland Prison, Durham, was arrested later that evening in December 2014.
Greater Manchester Police's Critical Wanted Team were looking for him in connection with a "large number of serious offences", the court heard.
Patmore has since admitted:
Conspiracy to rob a jeweller's in Yarm, Teesside, where second-hand designer watches worth £500,000 were taken in a raid by masked men who burst in and methodically smashed glass cabinets.
Conspiarcy to steal, by helping two raids by a Manchester-based gang on a cash machine in Bingley, West Yorkshire, and by purchasing tools used in a robbery in November 2014 on Fattorini's jeweller in Harrogate. The Crown accepted that Patmore did not go on the raid which netted the gang between £600,000 and £1 million.
Conspiracy to rob a house in Blackley, Manchester, in which two men were threatened and a motorbike and Audi S5 were stolen, and a "cash in transit" raid at the Nationwide Building Society in Sandbach, Cheshire.
Making counterfeit coins.
Patmore was being sentenced via a video-link from prison, while 10 others involved to different degrees were held in the dock at court.
The sentencing by Judge Tony Briggs is expected to finish on Thursday.
