A newspaper delivery man behaved despicably when he stole thousands of pounds from his elderly mother behind her back, a judge said today.
Nicholas Weaver got away with more than £62,000 after his mum Edith, now 94, asked him to look after her finances because she was going blind.
He set up an online account and fleeced her in a total of 114 transactions.
In a bid to cover his tracks, he changed bank statements and took out a £2,800 loan in his mum’s name – with repayments from her account.
She realised what was going on after her card was rejected at a supermarket and she checked with her bank.
The court heard his mum was so upset that she had left her Deeside home of 20 years and moved with her daughter to Scotland.
In a victim impact statement, she said she simply could not understand how he could do such a thing to his own elderly mother, who had trusted him implicitly.
Judge Nicolas Parry jailed Weaver, 62, of Woodlands Court, Mancot, Deeside, for 12 months at Mold Crown Court after he admitted stealing the money between 2009 and February last year.
He also admitted fraud after he took out the loan in her name.
The judge said he had committed “despicable offences” and “a significant breach of trust”.
But he would get the maximum one third credit in sentence because of his early guilty pleas.
Judge Parry said he would not order compensation, which he said would be dealt with at another tribunal.
Frances Willmott, prosecuting, said police were contacted last August when the defendant’s mother found that she was unexpectedly overdrawn.
She had checked with her bank and found 114 unauthorised withdrawals to her son’s account.
He also paid some money into her account when it was running low, and she discovered the loan taken out in her name. The repayments also came from her account.
The mother told police that six or seven years previously, as her eyesight started to deteriorate, she asked her son to help her and he set up the online banking system with her consent.
When requested, he would provide bank statements, but they had been edited to hide the true position.
He initially denied any wrongdoing in interview and said his mother had authorised the withdrawals, but he began shaking and became upset when the edited statements were produced, and admitted what he had done.
He accepted that he had been some £20,000 in debt and said the loan was taken out so that he could pay his mother’s tax bill without raising suspicion.
His mother told police that her son had been on a number of holidays but she did not know how those had been funded.
In a victim impact statement, she said she felt disgusted that her son had betrayed the trust she had placed in him.
She believed that she was comfortably well off in retirement but that was not the case.
Defending barrister Andrew Green said the defendant had lived with his mother all his life, and if he had told her of his financial difficulties she would probably have agreed to help him.
But he had now split the family by his offending and believed that he had been disinherited.
The offences came at a time of personal debt which increased and got out of control.
He had also been abusing alcohol for a number of years.
Mr Green said his client was a man of good character who carried out charitable works. He said he had been the president and secretary of a local charitable organisation.
DC Ian Hughes of Mold CID said: “This has been a difficult time for the family and we hope that today’s outcome will help them move on.”
see-http://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-news/despicable-deeside-man-stole-more-11324236
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