Bogus fitter conned clients to pay his gambling debt

VICTIMS HANDED OVER THOUSANDS OF POUNDS

- By KIRSTIE MCCRUMM

A CONMAN posed as a bathroom fitter and took advance payments of almost £20,000 but never completed the work.

Liam John Harbottle, 41, has been ordered to pay the cash back and given a two year prison sentence suspended for two years.

Harbottle, of Aiskew near Bedale, previously from Ripon, took thousands in advance payments from customers but failed to complete the work.

Officers found that he used alias names and repeatedly changed the name of his business, evading bad reviews and presenting himself as a genuine bathroom fitter.

The victims received pleading texts from him that he was desperate for advance payments because he had not been paid from previous employers and needed help with his bills. But his requests for money in advance coincided with spikes in his gambling debts, the investigation found.