Peterborough couple ordered to pay back more than £150,000 after fraud conviction

Neil Riley, 53, and his wife Kim Riley, 54, both of Crowson Crescent, Peterborough, were ordered to pay back around £157,000 following a POCA Confiscation Proceedings hearing at Peterborough Crown Court.

The couple were sentenced in May 2017 after being convicted of fraud offences. Over a period of three years, the couple fraudulently obtained more than £150,000 from a vulnerable and elderly victim.

Kim Riley had pleaded guilty to fraud by abuse of position and was jailed for 18 months, her husband admitted fraud by false representation and was jailed for 28 months. The Riley’s had been neighbours with their victim for 12 years, socialising with her and her late husband. In 2013 their victim, who was in her 80s, became ill and Kim Riley was awarded power of attorney and took over her affairs. When the victim died in August last year her executors discovered her care bills had not been paid for 10 months and large sums of cash had been transferred into the Riley’s account, totalling around £150,000.

Following the original sentencing hearing in 2017, DC Louise Mann, who investigated, said: “The victim believed the Riley’s were her friend and put them in this position of trust feeling they would look after her needs and best interests. “The Riley’s took advantage of her and betrayed this trust for their own financial gain. “This is an extremely sad case and I would urge anyone who believes a neighbour or friend may be the victim of a similar crime to contact police.”

Courts have also ordered other Cambridgeshire criminals to pay back money.

On Friday (12 January), a woman from Cambridge was ordered to pay back £33,000 following a POCA hearing. In 2015 Rosina Ceaser, 59, of Chatsworth Avenue, was convicted of money laundering after money defrauded from a victim passed through her bank account.

These are just two of a number of recent successful results achieved by ERSOU’s Regional Economic Crime Unit (RECU).

In December, a man who ran a property management company and defrauded clients of almost £400,000 was ordered to pay back more than £389,000 following another successful investigation by the unit.

Mark Procter, 42, formerly of Barker Close, Hail Weston, St Neots, was ordered to pay back the money after he was sentenced to three years and four months imprisonment for a number of fraud offences.

Detective Inspector Rob Turner, of the ERSOU RECU, said: “These recent proceeds of crime orders show how seriously the courts take these types of offences, where offenders take advantage of others to illegally gain access to funds which aren’t theirs.

“Our unit has been working incredibly hard to ensure that such ill-gotten gains are rightfully re-paid and I’m really pleased with these recent results. This should send a strong message to others that crime really will never pay.”