'Sophisticated' fraudster who conned 'lifelong friends and family' out of £600,000 with 'Ponzi scheme' jailed

Over a seven year period Richard Evans convinced 14 people that they would make huge returns on what turned out to be a 'Ponzi scheme', a court heard.

The scammer tricked long standing friends and family into investing more than £600,000 into a sports betting plan that he then ‘frittered’ on his family leaving his victims out of pocket.

Portsmouth Crown Court heard how most of the investors were 'lifelong friends' of Evans' parents and how his betrayal of trust led to a ‘fractured family’.

The 41-year-old, from South Warnborough, started the plan in 2014 with the prosecutors saying it was 'inevitably' going to fail leaving Evans without the means to repay investors.

The court heard how he 'frittered away' the money, which went straight into his bank account as well as using it to pay his mortgage.

In one family both parents and their two adult children invested in the scheme losing a grand sum of £225,050 between them.

Alison Wem said she felt she had 'failed as a mother' by recommending the investment to her family and her daughter, Rebecca Pooley, who invested money she had inherited from her dad at the age of 11.

In total, 14 people invested £612,807 which has yet to be repaid and the court heard that the investors signed a contract which promised a 15 per cent return on their investment guaranteed by Evans' wealthy business partner.

They were told their money would be invested through a company called Sports Trust in 'spread betting' but it transpired the company didn’t exist.

In 2015 Evan's relationship with his business partner broke down but he continued to claim his backing by forging his signature on contracts.

In total he made £106,000 in bets with an index company, a gambling firm specialising in spread betting, but was paid out just £52,987 meaning a loss of £53,000, plus a loss of £1,502 through bets with high street company Bet365.

Prosecutor Tim Moores said: "The fallout that has occurred, even between friends and family, between those who realised they were duped and those who still now refuse to believe Evans defrauded them was relevant to the fact that most people knew him, most of the investors were close family friends of his parents and their adult children.

"There were no true profits to pay to an investor who wanted to recoup their money or the interest, inevitably he arrived at a point when he did not have sufficient funds to pay back investors, he would stall them and give excuses as to why he could not pay.

"It is not a case where there are expenditures on large capital items, it is just a regular pattern of the defendant using the sums as his own, a lot of it has been frittered away on restaurants and bars."

The dad of two managed to keep the scheme going by making false annual statements to encourage people to keep their money invested but eventually Ms Wem and Ms Pooley got suspicious and reported him to the police in 2021.

Sentencing, Recorder Jaron Crooknorth said: "Although money was used to place bets it could not be called investing, there were no true profits, you made annual statements to induce more money.

"I do not accept there was little or no planning, this was sophisticated.

"This took place over a significant period, your actions were dishonest even if it did not start that way.

"You may well be ashamed, you certainly should be."

Mitigating, James Williams claimed that Evans' scheme had been a 'genuine' attempt to enrich himself and his investors.

He said: "They went into this with their eyes wide open - this was an attempt by Evans to make money, largely for himself and for the investors, that went catastrophically wrong."

Evans previously pleaded guilty to nine counts of fraud and two counts of money laundering and he has now been jailed for four and a half years.