A notorious con man has been found guilty of a £3.5 million property fraud, despite previously serving a prison sentence for a similar series of crimes.
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div>A notorious con man has been found guilty of a £3.5 million property fraud, despite previously serving a prison sentence for a similar series of crimes.
Richard Jerome posed as an international financier working for Unesco, making large cash offers for a series of houses in the South of England and claiming to have a personal fortune of more than £500 million from a bogus shipping and hotel empire.
Jerome, alongside his wife, Hazel, travelled around the area touting themselves as successful ex-pats who had just returned from the Caribbean – looking for a new residential retirement home.
Jerome targeted single and successful women who were looking to sell their homes, despite being a mini-cab driver with less than £200 to his name.
Jerome had previously served a 15- month sentence for fleecing an accountant out of $100,000, however within two days of release – the fraudster had already created a new false identity to commit similar atrocities.
In one case, the 66 year-old made an offer of £310,000, and then blamed delays on Jerome’s serious illness and his need for recuperation.
In another case, the jury heard how the couple allegedly used a false surname, Ausson, to broker a cash deal for a £750,000 cliff top property in Sidmouth, Devon, with sea views.
Jerome, 66, and ex- wife Hazel, aged 62, are both accused of making false representations that they had the funds to purchase Valhalla, in West Looe Hill, Looe, and Gazebo, in Peak Hill Road, Sidmouth, Ambleside House and Badby Lodge Farm, both near Daventry, Northamptonshire, between 2009 and 2011.
Jerome also faces three charges of obtaining more than £1,000 worth of surveys on the properties by deception and the $100,000 fraud against London based accountant Lalita Lalvani in 2011.
Judge Erik Salomonsen said: “He knows he is facing a long prison sentence.
“You know the score. You are a confidence trickster. You are a menace. You were a menace when you were convicted before and you continue to be a menace.”
The couple are expected to be sentenced in three weeks.
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