A woman who helped two Brighton fraudsters has been sentenced for her part in an £830,000 home improvement scam which cost some victims their life savings.
Louise Shiangkwang, also known as Louise Hammond, 50, of Grinstead Lane, Lancing, was given a 22-month prison sentence, suspended for two years today (Monday 14 February).
At Snaresbrook Crown Court, Judge Noel Casey also ordered her to carry out 160 hours of unpaid work and pay a victim surcharge of £140.
She is expected to face further hearings under the Proceeds of Crime Act to decide whether she must forfeit any of her criminal gains.
The court was told that Shiangkwang allowed her home to be used as a show home by a fraudulent business called Contemporary Home Improvements (CHI) run by a former Anglian Windows colleague.
Shiangkwang made false representations, pretending to at least nine people that CHI had built her kitchen extension but, the court was told, it had been built by her neighbour.
The work was used to lure prospective victims to make deposit payments which ran to thousands of pounds – and in several cases, tens of thousands of pounds.
Those involved in the fraud posted fake reviews on their company website and used false photographs of work which they claimed had been carried out by the company.
Ten days ago, on Friday 4 February, the two Brighton men who ran the scam, Brian Tutton and Scott Baker, were jailed – also by Judge Casey at Snaresbrook.
Brian Tutton, 62, formerly of Leahurst Court Road, Brighton, and Westmoreland Shortbridge Lodge, Mill Hill, Piltdown, Uckfield, was jailed for seven years. He was banned from being a company director for 10 years.
Scott Baker, 50, of Brighton, was jailed for four years. Baker, formerly of Braintree Road, Cosham, Portsmouth, and Two Mile Hill Road, Bristol, was banned from being a company director for five years.
The scam was supported by David Gogo, 30, of Barringer Square, Tooting, London, who passed himself off as an architect. He was sentenced to 14 months in prison, suspended for two years.
As Judge Casey sentenced Shiangkwang, he said: “She made representations that the company had carried out successful, timely and ‘on budget’ works of high quality whereas they had done no such work.”
Andrew Bishop, defending, said that Shiangkwang had made only £500 from the scam, with a promise of more money which she never received.
The judge did not appear to believe her claim and said that the victims had collectively lost £146,000 as a direct result of her role in the fraud.
He could not, though, be sure of the extent of her awareness of Tutton and Baker’s intentions not to carry out any work after taking deposits from dozens of people.
Judge Casey said that Shiangkwang was not coerced, adding: “Her motive was greed.”
But he accepted that she was a woman of previous good character and prior exemplary conduct.
The court was told that Shiangkwang had three children – one of them a young adult – and lived with her partner and two of his children.
The judge said that “on a narrow balance” he had decided to suspend her prison sentence, partly because of the effect that it would have on her family.
She knew what she was doing. Money talks, an it was speaking volumes to her.
So she had to do it. she had no choice. she couldnt resit the lure of filthy lucre.
As for the Fed of master builders, their rep must have been “on the square” to accept Tutton’s claim at face value, for his firm to be accepted!
The certs they issue, are not worth the paper they are written on.
The company exists, to serve their grand master….
“David Gogo, 30, of Barringer Square, Tooting, London, who passed himself off as an architect.”
He was the architect of his own making.
If he offers to design for u, ask him if he can use a tape measure first!
From an estate to offices in Leicester Square:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47-vt9IFOiE
How, when he couldn’t even use a tape measure.
There’s no accounting for taste or experience.