Elderly victim to get
bogus builder’s cash

Financial investigators from York Council used powers under the Proceeds of Crime Act for the first time yesterday to return money to a victim of crime.

It was granted permission by York magistrates to hand over £2,000 found on convicted fraudster Donovan Ross Morley Clough at the time of his arrest. It will be repaid to an 80-year-old woman who Morley-Clough had conned into paying for unnecessary and substandard roofing work.

Morley-Clough, 22, of Pinfold Close, Riccall, took the money last September after cold calling his victim who has dementia, falsely claiming she needed urgent work to her roof and then taking her to the bank to withdraw the cash. When he was arrested, police officers found him in possession of £2,000 in £20 notes which were later confirmed to be those withdrawn earlier that day.

Following an investigation by the council’s Trading Standards team and North Yorkshire Police, Morley-Clough was prosecuted.

He admitted 18 fraud and dishonesty offences relating to bogus roofing work committed over 14 months. At York Crown Court in June he was given a four-year sentence and an ASBO, preventing him trading as a roofer for ten years.

The hearing was told that he fleeced 18 victims out of £15,600. Two of Donovan Clough’s victims have died since the proceedings began.

Coun Linsay Cunningham-Cross, the council’s member for crime and stronger communities said yesterday: “Donovan Clough was ruthless. He took vast sums of money from vulnerable people who he tricked into trusting him and whose trust he abused.”