Fraudster jailed for trying to sell the Ritz
A conman who tried to sell London’s Ritz Hotel for £250m has been jailed for five years.
The out-of-work lorry driver, from North Yorkshire, managed to dupe his victims into handing over £1m for the landmark hotel, according to BBC reports.
Jurors at Southwark Crown Court heard that he pretended to be a close friend of the hotel’s owners, the reclusive billionaire Barclay brothers.
Sentencing him, Judge Stephen Robbins said: “You were found guilty by a jury of this elaborate and outrageous scam, purporting to sell the Ritz Hotel, thereby obtaining £1m from your victim.”
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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