back to article Police force eBay scammer to cough up ill-gotten gains

Lancashire Police have obtained a confiscation order to seize over £100,000 from a convicted eBay scammer. Jonathan Hartley, of Scotland Road, Nelson is currently banged up for obtaining services by deception, fraud and money laundering. The 26-year old is serving 18 months for the offences. He sold fake or defective …

COMMENTS

This topic is closed for new posts.
  1. Simon Neill

    Uh...

    Why is this money not going entirely back to the people ripped off? either the end customer, paypal or credit card company, whoever ended up footing the bill.

  2. Lee Sexton
    Thumb Down

    Typical

    Nice of the Crown to think of the victims in this one, £927 set aside for them and the rest of the £102k goes to the State? Lovely......

  3. Stu
    Stop

    Erm...

    Surely if he's made money by ripping people off, then the people he ripped off should be getting all of their money back. So why are the police/magistrates getting any of his "ill-gotten gains"???

  4. My Opinion
    Thumb Down

    Doesn't add up!

    £141,028.52 in ill-gotten gains, yet they can only find 34 victims to return £927.52 to?

    If they have the eBay records they should be able to track down ALL of the defrauded eBayers.

    Something somehwhere just doesn't add up ..... or maybe it does:

    "Under the rules half of the rest of the money is split between the Crown Prosecution Service, the Magistrates' Court Service and the police"

    So the less we return the more we get to keep!

  5. Sooty

    wait a minute

    over £100,000 siezed and only £900 returned to the victims. The rest is being shared out amoungst the police.

    Somehow that seems slightly wrong!

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Unhappy

    why do plod, CPS et al get a share?

    They're already being funded by the taxpayer.

    Presumably the 142 grand is the total amount he stole, thus it should all go to his victims.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    wtf?

    "The court set aside £927.52 for 34 victims of his scams."

    out of £141k?

    Looks like the real scammers here are the CPS

  8. Lee
    Thumb Down

    WHAT!!!

    The first dibs on the money should be those he scammed... not the fucking court system...sheesh

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Council tax

    Every £100k Lancs Constabulary trawl in from felons is £100k less they'll siphon from my Council Tax next year - go get 'em Floyd!

  10. Gordon Pryra

    Why are you complaining?

    Thats been our tax system for hundreds of years.

    100k Tax = 1k spent on the British Public

    the other 99k goes on MP's living expenses and the cost of mothballing fighters

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    hang on

    he scammed people for 140K, 100K is being seized back and yet only 1K is being given back to the people he stole it from. Would the real scamers please stand up for a round of applause?

  12. Ash
    Joke

    @Whinging and moaning above

    Well, yes, sir, the payout will be £900, but there are many other factors to be considered: window tax, swamp insurance, hen food, dog biscuits, cow ointment -- the expenses are endless.

  13. Camilla Smythe

    Really!!!!

    You people complaining about the relative split of recovered monies.

    In the first case it costs lots of money to prosecute these sort of cases because legal type people cost, and they are certainly worth a lot more than you common oiks, a lot of money to train and employ plus they probably have lavish lifestyles and needs well beyond the sort of second hand sort of tat your lot are likely to grummage about on Ebay for.

    Then if you lot saw fit to pay them a decent wage in the first place they would not be forced to go for 'high' worth cases just so they can cover their costs.

    Seriously, have you ever had caviar and pheasant sandwiches with bread?

    I did not think so but I'm sure that even you would agree that the bread part of a chip butty is just undesireable wadding. See?

    Typical knee jerk reaction. Your lot should step back and get things in perspective before you go off moaning about how other people are forced to behave by, unfair, circumstance in order to put food on their tables.

    At least the pople who are getting this money will be capable of spending it wisely.

    Personally speaking I think it was unwise to give those 34 what amounts to £27 each. I'm sure their minds won't be able to cope with the concept of such large amounts of money all at once. It'll probably turn them into drug addicts or alcoholics and will certainly not help with their addiction to ShitBay.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Alert

    @Hang On

    it wasn't air he was selling it was fake goods.. which oddly still have a cost say 40k's worth...

    I agree that the ebay records used to convict should Identify those to whom the money should be returned. it stinks!

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    "He sold... defective electronic goods on eBay"

    So, you'll be jailed for selling Xbox 360s now?

  16. Elmer Phud
    Happy

    @ Camilla

    "pheasant sandwiches with bread"

    Got some of those on eBay - a wee bit too much bread for me.

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    Shhh ... don't let the Treasury know.

    But there again it doesn't need to.

    The gov might just trurn around and say "Oh, I see Lancs Constabulary has obtained xk GBP and so-and-so obtained Yk GBP. We will drop your gov sourced funding by an equivalent amount.

  18. Rob
    Go

    Nice little earner...

    .... for the coppers that is. I'm sure they have a little margin for profit in there after covering legal costs, businesses need to make a profit after all.

  19. Gilbo

    Titchy

    Could you make that mugshot of him a bit bigger please? I can't quite count his nostril hairs.

  20. Slackness
    Stop

    Errr

    Why does the REG look more like Fark daily?

    /Hammer Time

  21. Graham Marsden
    Thumb Down

    Bonus culture...?

    So we'll now see the Police vigorously pursuing lots of other cases like this because they get a cut of the wonga that the victims have had stolen from them?

    What next? When you're burgled, they retrieve your property, but they'll get to keep your flat-screen TV...?

  22. RRRoamer

    Funny that ...

    the police are swindling the people out of the money a second time.

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Flame

    Re: Really!!!!

    Camilla Smythe: "You people complaining about the relative split of recovered monies."

    Yes, really! Apart from record company executives, who else is making 99% commission on anything? Not even eBay can manage that!

    I don't deny that the plod probably put the hours in investigating the case, as did all the legal servants of Her Majesty, but I doubt that those scammed had zero investment in the time spent bringing about this outcome.

  24. Dave
    Heart

    Sorry to interupt your flaming but...

    being convicted of a CRIMINAL offence doesn't entitle the victim to restitution - that would be up to each victim to take a CIVIL case themselves.

    For better or worse its the way the legal system works, has done for some time and will continue to do whether you read about it on The Register or not.

    AFAIK Barristers for the prosecution are all self employed, so is it better for the guilty party to pay their fees, or the taxpayer? I think the former personally.

  25. David

    Police benevolent fund?

    Why should the fuzz get any of it? I believe the payment for members of this esteemed and illustrious body is supported by our taxes. Sounds border-line despicable to me.

  26. Death_Ninja
    Black Helicopters

    Your flexible fiend

    The rest of the money probably went to the credit card companies.... who almost certainly will be the ones loosing out on this.

    I know its hard to find sympathy for them but...

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Alert

    Someone stole all of your silverware

    Hello. This is the police calling about the burglary. You've reported that someone stole all of your silverware and jewelry. Don't worry. We've apprehended the thief, and we'll return your property shortly. Minus our expenses of course... Here's your butter knife and an earring. Oh sorry, my mistake, can't let you keep the butter knife. Knives are too dangerous to be in the wrong hands!

    @Death_Ninja CC companies sometimes profit from fraud

  28. Anonymous Coward
    Heart

    Well...

    Can't really blame them for keeping something from this. I mean the people who got scammed are to blame themselves for being so easily scammed. At least they now are more wary of such future attempts hopefully and is a good lesson. If the scammer was not caught, they wouldn't have even gotten a dime back. Consider this work expense? The least the police could do is let everyone the guy scammed a shot at him for a bit of punishment shall we say. You can keep the money as payment for his punishment :D

    These days, its so easy for people to scam and live lavishly in a hoboish state where they don't have to do anything at all to get cash from ads/scam/donations.

  29. N

    Im gobsmacked

    "Lancs plod should get around 18 per cent of the takings"

    Tell me, why in Gods name should they profit from criminal activity?

    The money should all be returned to its rightful owners

  30. Booty003

    @ Camilla, Surely a Wind Up....?

    Nobody can seriously be THAT Twatish.....?

  31. John Dougald McCallum

    @ac Wednesday 20th May 2009 08:01 GMT

    "Can't really blame them for keeping something from this. I mean the people who got scammed are to blame themselves for being so easily scammed." So tell me when did eBay start having videos on their website last time I was there it was all stills and only one at that,for most of the "sales" anyway,as you only see what you paid for after it has been delivered how can anyone tell if it is genuine and works or a bit of trash even some of the fakes work.Also if I rember correctly most of his bits were sold for a couple of quid each.

  32. Simon B
    Stop

    Who's the thief here?

    Sounds to me like the courts and police what locking up for theft, who do they think they are? politicians?!!!!!

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Framly Frontbottom says...

    You're all just jealous.

This topic is closed for new posts.

Other stories you might like