Two men have been sent to jail for fraud offences after they overcharged a 90-year-old Neath woman for gardening work.
Alf Peter Marshall Probert, aged 19, and Jamie Lee Smith, aged 20, both of the Ebbw Vale area, were convicted at Neath Magistrates Court and received 112-day custodial sentences.
They were tracked down and arrested following a police investigation led by PC Martin Jenkins of the Glynneath Neighbourhood Policing Team after charging the vulnerable victim £1,400 to have a lawn and hedge cut at her home in the Neath Valley last August.
PC Jenkins said: “These individuals travelled from Ebbw Vale and targeted their elderly victim and confused her into believing that she had asked them to carry out this gardening work for the price of £1,400.
“I was struck by the callous nature of this crime as the victim had been conned out of this money in her own home.”
The Safer Neath Port Talbot Partnership has been working in recent weeks to prevent this type of offence by visiting more than 400 homes of vulnerable people to issue rogue trader prevention advice.
Rogue traders use unscrupulous tactics and target residents, particularly the elderly or vulnerable, and deliberately overcharge for unsatisfactory services. They are often linked to distraction burglaries.
This can include charging for unnecessary work, damaging property deliberately in order to obtain money to repair it, leaving work unfinished or even intimidating residents in order to extort money.
Inspector Mark Lenihan of the Safer Neath Port Talbot Partnership added: “There have been some disturbing incidents where people have been conned out of lots of money after being intimidated by rogue traders.
“Our recent work was designed to raise awareness of this issue and to ask people to be vigilant and look out for their elderly friends or relatives.
“The conviction and imprisonment of the rogue traders in the Glynneath area sends out a clear message that this type of crime will not be tolerated and perpetrators will be tracked down and brought to justice.”
