Woman who conned elderly Shropshire couple out of £74,000 avoids jail

Barbara Stone, 62, pleaded guilty to two counts of fraud by false representation, pressurising elderly and vulnerable people into paying for advertising worth £88,239 during her time as a sales representative for Aspire magazine.

Among those she targeted were John and Olga Moyle of Cleeton St Mary, near Ludlow.

She pestered the couple for £74,139 in advertising payments from January 2010 to November 2012, claiming they would be refunded by a sponsor, which all happened while Mrs Moyle was seriously ill and being cared for by Mr Moyle.

Both are now deceased and daughter Frances says the fraud "cast a shadow" over the end of their lives.

Stone, of Taunton Close, Leicester, was told by Judge Stuart Rafferty at Nottingham Crown Court yesterday that she "directly made people's lives a misery" but narrowly avoided custody as she was given a 22-month suspended sentence.

Frances Moyle said her father was trying to advertise his small holiday home in the south of France when he was first cold-called by Stone about it, before being "bombarded" with further sales calls. He was also targeted by Stone's former employers, convicted fraudsters Wyvern Media Group, and lost a total of £97,024. He died in April 2015 aged 83.

Frances said she believed the stress also hastened her mother's death in February 2011.

She said: "My frail father was targeted and subjected to high pressure, invasive selling techniques, considerable duress and fraudulent tactics that led to the loss of all his savings and saw the last days of my mother's life marred by stress and fear.

"A man who had been so careful with money all his life was plunged into so much debt that he was forced to sell the home he and my mother had shared for 50 years. Being targeted by Barbara Stone and then Wyvern Media had the most devastating and ruinous effect on our family.

"My poor father never recovered from the events of that year which cast a shadow over the end of his life, and continue to cast a shadow over mine."

The East Midlands Trading Standards Regional Investigation Team, hosted by Nottinghamshire County Council, was led to Stone via an investigation into Wyvern Media.

The directors of Wyvern Media were given prison sentences totalling 15 and half years in October, for offences that included the case of Jutta Patterson, the owner of Birch Hill Dog Rescue at Neen Sollars, near Cleobury Mortimer, who was defrauded of more than £5,000.

Stone also targeted Mrs Patterson separately, defrauding her of £14,100 from November 2011 to January 2012.

Mrs Patterson died from cancer aged 64, shortly after being conned, in 2015.