International Law

Why Do You Believe the Con Man's Lies?

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Interesting story from the Telegram, UK about a brazen conman and his victims:

"Fraudster Mark Wilkinson fabricated outlandish "business opportunities" to cheat £114,000 from his unwitting victims - including pretending he had been gifted a palace and millions of pounds from a generous Arab sheikh.

Wilkinson, of Shotshole Bank, Spalding, admitted five charges of deception and three of fraud between November 2004 and January 2008.

He also asked for six further offences to be taken into consideration.

Jailing him for three years, Judge Robert Alan Brown told Wilkinson: "You are a cheat. You are a liar. You are a professional conman. "You are no doubt plausible when convincing your prey but ruthless.

All you are interested in is if they have money and how you can con it out of them. The public needs protecting from you."

Noel Philo, mitigating for Wilkinson, said his client had got into financial difficulties after borrowing money from a loan shark.

He said the conman's victims had been "happy to swallow the most extraordinary stories".

"It is very difficult to understand how they can have been taken in by the lies he was spinning," he said.

"The public needs protecting from you."

Interesting - but, how do we do it? Throwing individuals in jail simply removes them from the game for awhile. When Wilkinson gets back out, how will the public be better protected?

Especially, since the victims cannot explain how they were taken in by the outrageous lies. Without that self knowledge, spread through the connectedness of the internet, the public will not be protected by this jail term.

Full post as published by Misleading Advertising Law on October 01, 2008 (boomark / email).