A CROOKED estate agent has been given a suspended jail sentence for swindling £150,000 out of clients and friends to try to prop up his failing business.

Russell Baker promised to pay back loans of up to £70,000 within weeks but only managed to repay a tiny fraction of what he borrowed.

He browbeat a customer who bought a house through his estate agency into paying him a £22,500 deposit on a house which they were buying. He pocketed the money instead of passing it on to the sellers.

Baker, aged 59, ran Ashby’s in Fore Street, Bovey Tracey, and told many of his victims he had a short term cash flow problem or needed money to buy out business partner Emma Lewis.

In reality, he was already struggling with massive debts and he transferred most of the money straight into his private account, Exeter Crown Court was told.

Baker escaped an immediate jail sentence after a judge was told he has sold his home and is selling land to raise money to repay the victims.

He is now living in a mobile home in the car park of a pub where his wife works as a barmaid. He no longer has a business and now works for a catering firm in Chudleigh.

Baker, formerly of Green Lane, Ilsington, near Newton Abbot, admitted nine frauds worth a total of £157,000 and was jailed for 20 months, suspended for two years, and ordered to do 160 hours unpaid community work.

Recorder Mr Noel Casey also set a timetable under the Proceeds of Crime Act to strip Baker of any remaining assets after he has repaid around £150,000 from the sale of his house and a valuable parcel of land.

He told him: ’You borrowed from friends and business acquaintances sums of money you said were to be put into your business but diverted elsewhere, no doubt because they would have been swallowed in short order because of the perilous state of the agency following the financial crash of 2008.

’You must have known you could not repay them. One count is more egregious because you pocketed a pre-contract deposit, which shows a different level of culpability and could have endangered the purchase of the house.

’This was a course of conduct conducted over six months and it was therefore sustained. It came on the back of you taking out loans and borrowing money to keep the business going, so by this time there was no prospect of repaying them.’

The Recorder said he was able to suspend the sentence because of Baker’s previous good character, his efforts to repay the money and his remorse and shame at what he had done.

Mr Tom Bradnock, prosecuting, said the frauds all took place in 2013 when Baker approached friends and business contacts to borrow money, which he promised to repay within weeks or months.

He said: ’By January 2013 he was already heavily in debt and in a sense was robbing Peter to pay Paul.’

The first victim lent him £15,000, which was paid into a business account from which Baker transferred £5,000 to himself the same day.

The next lent him £20,000 after being told he would be repaid with £6,000 interest, and further victims loaned from £2,000 to £35,000. Some lent more money on the promise of being repaid earlier loans.

Baker took a deposit of £22,500 from a house buyer by saying it was necessary to secure the transaction. The buyers only realised what he had done when they completed the purchase and the money was not deducted.

He repaid £6,000 of the money but kept the rest and paid back £2,650 cash to one of the borrowers. Another secured her £25,000 loan by taking a charge on his house, so she will be repaid in full.

Mr Bradnock said there is unlikely to be any equity left from the sale of Baker’s home in Ilsington, but his land, which is due to be sold very shortly, is valued at £155,000.

He said this will be distributed at a pro rata basis among not only the nine victims whose cases were taken to court, but others who loaned roughly £100,000 more but whose cases have remained on file.

Mr Joss Ticehurst, mitigating, said Baker was trying to save his business and the jobs of his staff in the wake of the 2008 property crash and at the time hoped he would be able to repay the cash.

He was suffering from anxiety and depression and his judgment was further impaired by medication he was prescribed for the conditions.

He said: ’He was not a man who was hell bent on defrauding people at any opportunity just for the sake of stealing money. He had many years of being a successful businessman and had always acted with integrity in the past.

’He deluded himself and buried his head in the sand. He found himself out of his depth. He remains of the view he should repay what he took because he has a moral responsibility. He even kept the truth from his own wife.

’He has been totally wiped out. He has been left with nothing from a lifetime of hard work. I could be said it is comeuppance but he has lost everything. He has lost his reputation and any plans for a comfortable retirement.

’He is living in temporary accommodation in a mobile home because he and his wife cannot afford anything else.

’He is genuinely ashamed that he led people a merry dance. It is perhaps more shameful than the prospect of prison for him to have to walk out of court and live with the indignity of the community learning about this case.’