A mother and her father have been jailed after stealing £50,000 from her two daughters as part of a fraudulent scheme. Katherine Hill, 53, from Alltwen in Pontardawe, Neath Port Talbot, and her 93-year-old father Gerald Hill from Fairwood in Swansea were sentenced to 30 months in prison and a suspended 12-month sentence, respectively. Both were found guilty of fraud by abuse of power after a trial last month at a Swansea Crown Court hearing.
The money was left to Hill’s daughters, Jessica and Gemma Thomas, by their grandmother, Margaret Hill, who died in 2013. Hill was also left with about £40,000 from her late mother’s house. The sisters’ inheritance was supposed to be held in a trust until they turned 25, with the defendants as trustees. They were just 15 and 12 at the time, which exploited their vulnerability as they had no control over it.
Prosecutor James Hartson stated that between March 2016 and March 2017, the account where the money was held was emptied in 10 withdrawals. £35,000 was withdrawn in three transactions alone. The sisters discovered that their money had gone when Gemma Thomas wished to access some of it for a house deposit in 2018. A civil investigation was launched and then the family contacted the police.
The court heard that Katherine Hill had asked her father for help in taking the money and that her father “was recruited and exploited by Katherine Hill for the purposes of carrying out the fraud”. Mr Hartson stated that Gerald Hill “was clearly involved through exploitation or coercion” by his daughter, and his culpability was “much less”
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