Episode 9 Doorstep Crime 999



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Transcript


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We're investigating one of the most shocking areas of crime and it can hit us all right on our doorsteps.

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From cold-calling con men to rip-off rogue traders, we're determined to fight back.

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All over the UK, award-winning police and Trading Standards teams are tackling them

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and you've not been shy about telling us your views.

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Today, an audacious crook pays the price for conning almost £1 million out of West Yorkshire consumers.

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I've been in business myself quite a while and I thought I could tell a shifty person.

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I believed this man 100%.

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A pair of rogue builders from Oxfordshire are brought to justice

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after fleecing their victims out of £100,000.

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I realised I'd been scammed for certain

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the day we found the toilet unplumbed in the middle of the kitchen floor.

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Plus the innovative online warning system that helps communities fight back against local crime.

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I went to see if there were any new emails and there was one from the police,

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warning about a young girl who would ring at the door.

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The bell rang, I went downstairs and opened the door and there she was.

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Hello and a huge thanks for all your emails. We really appreciate them.

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Rosalind Willets from Leicestershire and David Williams from Lincolnshire

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are concerned about doorstep crime.

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David believes that setting up "no cold-calling zones" is a great way to tackle it.

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I find it very reassuring to know

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that the various law enforcement agencies are gradually catching up with the crooks who plague us all.

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That's certainly true in Oxfordshire because in January 2012,

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the conviction of local dodgy traders hit the headlines.

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Take a good look at these two.

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Trevor Bateman and David Merriman were rogue builders who defrauded thousands of pounds from people

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and left a trail of damage and misery throughout the south-east.

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But their activities have finally been brought to an end

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and Martin Woodley of Oxfordshire Trading Standards is hopeful of seeing them get their comeuppance.

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It's been a long, complex investigation

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and it's taken us three years to get to this stage.

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This is the finale now

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and we'll see what sentence they get.

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This hopefully can put a closure on this and put a lot of other victims' minds at rest.

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But let's rewind to see how Bateman and Merriman targeted one victim,

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68-year-old Jane Thomas,

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who was doorstepped at her Oxfordshire home in June 2009.

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The pair operated as A&S Builders,

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not to be confused with any reputable company of a similar name.

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They said they were from A&S Builders.

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They were doing work in the district.

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I said I needed the garden clearing and tidying up and would they like to give me a quote for it?

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So he said "yes" and went off.

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A couple of days later, A&S joint boss Trevor Bateman appeared at Jane's door

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with a quote for £800 to clear her garden and repair the pathway.

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'Trevor was very plausible, VERY plausible.'

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He directed me and a friend of mine to go and look at some brickwork

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that had been done on another house nearby, which we did and we liked the look of it,

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so we thought everything was going to be all right.

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The following Monday, all these blokes arrived and started to clear the garden.

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As work was progressing nicely, Jane suggested another job for them.

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I invited them to have a look at the bathroom which also needed quite a lot of attention

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because a local plumber had left it in a bit of a mess,

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so they gave me a quote for the bathroom as well.

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Bateman quoted £2,500 to install a new bathroom which Jane agreed to.

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Throughout, there were no written quotations.

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Trevor Bateman said he needed to be paid in cash

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and that request was generally on a Friday.

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And he needed the cash to pay his workforce, he said.

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And so I had to go to the bank on a Friday and withdraw the cash.

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As well as his demands for money,

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Bateman also tried to pressurise Jane into having other jobs done as well,

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which thankfully, she refused, but things were already getting out of hand.

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The problem with it all was that lots of different people arrived

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at different times to do different things,

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and I got very confused as to who was who and what was happening.

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It's easy to see why poor Jane was feeling overwhelmed.

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Martin Woodley of Oxfordshire Trading Standards led the case against Bateman and Merriman.

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They were targeting the elderly and the vulnerable

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and most of our victims were females living alone.

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This was one of their trademarks.

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They wanted the money on a Friday to pay the boys. They wouldn't give any leeway and they put the pressure on.

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By now, this unwieldy gang of rogue builders had stripped Jane's bathroom, leaving it unusable,

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but worse was still to come.

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I realised I'd been scammed... for certain

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the day we found the toilet unplumbed in the middle of the kitchen floor.

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That is just shocking. We'll hear more about Bateman and Merriman's disastrous handiwork

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and find out the results of their court appearance a little later on.

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We love reading about your tips on tackling doorstep crime

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and you've been very keen to tell us face to face your views on the whole subject.

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The older generation were brought up to be trusting and it's difficult if somebody is pleasant to you

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to think they have an ulterior motive. We should be more cautious.

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Sometimes people feel embarrassed and ashamed about these doorstep crimes,

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but they shouldn't feel embarrassed to go and report them.

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When people come offering to tarmac the drive cheaply

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or claiming that my roof needs some work and offering to do that,

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I would tell them that I would insist on getting three quotes before commissioning anyone to do some work.

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Here's another example of doorstep crime.

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Hello, Gloria. I'm David Platt and I was one of these victims of this doorstep crime.

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I want to be on your programme, so no-one else has to go through what I've been through.

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It's been horrendous and it must stop.

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We'll take a closer look at that story later on, but first, news of a wonderful online messaging service

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that's helping police and residents share information and protect themselves against doorstep crime.

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We've been to Hertfordshire to see it in action.

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Love it or loathe it,

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there's no doubt technology can be incredibly useful, as seen in the work of Hertfordshire Police.

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The Online Watch Link, or OWL as it's known, is a website which anybody can sign up to

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and enables the police to warn residents by email, phone, fax or text

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about criminal activity before they can be targeted.

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And OWL is proving a great success

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as almost 100,000 people have joined the scheme across Hertfordshire, Staffordshire and North Wales

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since it started in 2010.

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But one person who wishes she'd signed up is 86-year-old Jolanda Wheeler.

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On a late afternoon in January 2011, she was relaxing at home in St Albans.

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There was a knock on the door and a young lady stood there.

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She was holding her hand very carefully and said,

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"I've just had an accident. I think I've broken my fingers.

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"Could I come in? Could I put them in cold water?"

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I was very sympathetic and said, "Of course, come on in."

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I'm sure lots of us would be happy to help a young person in need and caring Jolanda was no exception.

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But something didn't seem quite right.

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She said, "I think I might have broken the wrist."

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I should have seen that this wasn't broken, but I was so concerned about it.

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As she tended to her injuries, Jolanda was too preoccupied

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to take much notice of the man who was at the door with her.

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The gentleman in the back said, "Can I use your toilet?"

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I said, "It's just by the door," and off he went.

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He came back again and this man said, "Right, I'd better go back to the car

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"because Mother is waiting in there and I'll tell her what's happened." And he left.

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And after a minute, she said, "I think that will do now."

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I gave her a towel and she very carefully cleared it up and left.

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The pair had only been in the house for minutes

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and Jolanda thought nothing more of it until the following day.

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It wasn't until the morning...

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..when my handbag wasn't anywhere.

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And I thought, "Oh, I came from shopping. I left it on the chair in the kitchen."

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Sort of under the table.

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It wasn't there either and that's when the penny dropped.

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Jolanda had been the victim of a classic distraction burglary.

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The girl had diverted her with the phoney injury

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while her male accomplice had stolen Jolanda's handbag containing over £100.

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I have learnt something and that is not to be quite so trusting

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and certainly when I'm on my own in the house,

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not to ask anybody in.

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Disturbingly, it soon became clear that poor Jolanda was only one victim

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in a series of distraction burglaries across the region.

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Detective Sergeant Duncan Woodhams leads Operation Manhunt

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which is a Hertfordshire Police initiative dealing specifically with doorstep crime.

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It's fairly unusual to have a young female in distraction burglaries,

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the fact that she was claiming to have hurt her wrist on each occasion,

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the fact that she was picking on mainly female, elderly victims

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and always committing these offences in the late afternoon or early evening.

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To try to prevent these doorstepping thieves from striking again,

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Duncan and his team turned to their secret weapon - the Online Watch Link.

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It was a warning email from OWL after Jolanda's burglary

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which helped prevent 74-year-old Lyn Parkyns from becoming another victim of the doorstepping duo.

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As luck would have it, she had signed up to the scheme a matter of weeks before.

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I had just taken my husband to the station

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and when I got back, as I usually do,

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I went into the study which is just by the front door

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to see if there were any new emails, and there was one from the police,

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warning about a young girl

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who would ring at the door, say she'd hurt her wrist and could she run it under cold water,

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but on no account to let her in.

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I then went upstairs and about five minutes later, the bell rang.

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I went downstairs, opened the door and there she was.

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A youngish girl, dark hair, looked to me about 15 or 16, holding her wrist,

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saying could she run it under cold water?

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There's a bizarre coincidence, but thanks to the warning email,

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Lyn knew just what to do.

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I said something like, "We've all heard your story," or, "We know about you, goodbye," and shut the door.

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I thought perhaps it was the wrong thing to do because I'd alerted her to the fact people knew about her.

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Their confrontation with Lyn must have unsettled the pair

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because the distraction burglaries ended as quickly as they had begun.

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The victims had described the girl as being aged anything between 12 and 20,

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but police were eventually able to identify her as 22-year-old Amy Cotterell,

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a doorstepping criminal who had been arrested for similar offences in the Midlands,

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which is where Duncan and his team caught up with her early in 2010.

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Amy Cotterell was arrested by my team in Wolverhampton on the 20th of January.

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She was brought back to Hertfordshire and interviewed over a couple of days.

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She eventually admitted her part in the ten offences of distraction burglary.

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Although she refused to name her accomplice in crime,

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Amy Cotterell was charged with a series of distraction burglaries

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and in December 2011, was sentenced to four and a half years in prison.

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For Lyn Parkyns, her close shave with the dodgy doorsteppers

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has proved the value of the Online Watch system and she can continue to be forewarned.

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I think most people wouldn't let a stranger in,

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but in this case, the girl looked so young and vulnerable

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that a lot of people would take pity on her and would have let her in.

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If I hadn't had that message, I would have done.

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The OWL message received by Miss Parkyns prevented her becoming a victim to Amy Cotterell. I'm sure.

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Because of the message she received, she could contact the right people quickly and inform us

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of the doorstep crime that she was suffering.

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Still to come, we hear about the West Yorkshire businessman

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who scammed residents for almost £1 million.

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To trust that person, I was very angry with myself. I should have made further enquiries.

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That's what I should have done and that's what everybody else should do.

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At this stage, it's time to return to Oxfordshire

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to discover the fate of the rogues who made life so miserable for consumers there.

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You'll remember that in June 2009, Jane Thomas had been doorstepped at her Oxfordshire home

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by a company called A&S Builders, owned by Trevor Bateman and David Merriman.

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She had agreed to pay them a total of £3,200 to clear her garden and install a new bathroom,

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but instead, she had been left with an enormous mess and a huge problem.

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One day, I came home only to find the toilet in the middle of the kitchen floor, unplumbed in.

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And as it was the only toilet in the house, this was a huge inconvenience.

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Too true! It was only when Jane's son became involved

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that Bateman agreed to temporarily re-plumb the toilet back in,

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but by then, Jane's bathroom had been left in disarray for weeks.

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One of the cats jumped up and knocked the washbasin into the bath,

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thereby chipping the bath and breaking the pedestal.

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I had to go to the builders to get a new pedestal for the bathroom.

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But arguably, Bateman and Merriman's most disgusting tactic

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was to con their victims into paying for unnecessary labour,

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meaning that Jane was now faced with an extortionate bill of £6,800.

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That's twice what she had originally agreed.

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They go in for a low price,

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then create all this other work or suggest work

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and then keep taking money until either the money has run out

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or they cannot carry that work out any more because they haven't got the skills or the knowledge.

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The work for both the bathroom and the garden altogether took about four weeks

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and even then, it wasn't finished.

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And it was a very stressful time

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because I was worrying about the money, the fact that they weren't getting on with it

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and the fact that there were all these odd people in and out of the house all the time.

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Having reached the end of her tether, Jane rightly contacted Oxfordshire Trading Standards.

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The fightback against these rip-off merchants was about to begin.

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She actually came into the office with her daughter and she was very distressed.

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I then went to court and I managed to obtain some warrants

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and then 15 officers from Trading Standards, Oxfordshire Trading Standards,

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went over at about four o'clock in the morning

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to execute warrants at three addresses in Wiltshire.

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We were helped by Wiltshire Police and we were able to look at many more potential victims

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and that's when we started looking into other incidents.

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Trevor Bateman and David Merriman were finally arrested in December 2010

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and charged with unfair trading, money laundering and fraud,

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totalling almost £100,000.

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So let's whizz back to Oxford Crown Court in January 2012

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where Martin and his Trading Standards team are waiting to see

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if these rogue traders are going to be off the streets once and for all.

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We've just had a terrific result.

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Mr Merriman has received a three and a half years' prison sentence

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and Mr Bateman four years.

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It's a conclusion to the two and a half to three years of hard work

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put in by all those involved in Trading Standards

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and also it's a conclusion for the victims. They can put it behind them now.

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For Jane Thomas, the experience has been upsetting,

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but even a daily reminder of her run-in with Bateman and Merriman can't quite dampen her spirits.

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It's an upside-down tile in the bath.

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Whenever I sit in the bath, I look at it and I think, "I wish he hadn't done that."

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I'm left with the eternal memory of Trevor Bateman and his shoddy workmanship.

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That was a great result for Oxford Trading Standards and it must be an enormous relief to the victims.

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I've had a letter from Mike Oliver in Swansea

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who is justly proud of getting a "no cold-calling zone" set up

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in his neck of the woods of Neath Port Talbot.

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The scheme was approved in December 2011 and it's the first one of its kind in the area.

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There are at least 450 residents who will benefit from the protection,

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so keep up the good work, Mike, and thanks very much for the letter.

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Now we have an extraordinary story waiting for us in West Yorkshire

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where one doorstepping con man pocketed almost £1 million from consumers.

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Fortunately, the law caught up with him soon enough.

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The crook in question is Jack Darrell Henry.

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His unusual doorstep crime involved persuading people their homes were in the wrong council tax band.

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For a small cut, he promised to help them apply to the local councils to have their homes re-assigned,

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enabling them to claw back money that they'd otherwise have to pay in council tax.

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That's just what pensioner David Platt was hoping for when one of Henry's salesmen came knocking.

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A gentleman came to the door and asked if he could come in

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and talk to me about reducing my council tax.

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He was a smart gentleman in his early 30s, well dressed, clean.

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We sat in the lounge and talked for quite a while about different things.

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He quite simply convinced me that he could save me some money and also get me some cash repayments.

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The smooth-talking salesman said he worked for Council Tax Review

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or CTR, which was owned by Jack Henry.

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Of course, CTR should not be confused with companies of a similar name.

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The salesman claimed that David was owed a substantial rebate of £4,000,

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plus he could save at least £25 per month on his future council tax.

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I've been in business myself quite a while and thought I could tell a... I use the words "a shifty person".

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I believed this man 100%,

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the way he talked to me,

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particularly when he gave me his own mobile number, "Please contact me at any time you wish."

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That convinced me even more that it was a genuine offer.

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And for me to get £4,000 cash as a retired pensioner, it certainly makes you want to do it.

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£4,000 in cash sounds too good to be true, doesn't it? Well, you've guessed it - it was.

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The salesman promised David his claim would be sent to the valuation office agency immediately,

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but to take advantage of this tempting offer, he needed to make a payment to CTR there and then.

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The salesman asked me if I would sign the agreement document

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and would I pay £145,

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which would be refundable if the case didn't succeed

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and this case would be dealt with in between three and six months.

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I had no hesitation whatsoever in giving him a cheque to the value of £145 payable to CTR.

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Even though CTR would take up to 10% of the rebate as commission on top,

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it still seemed like a good idea.

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But sure enough, CTR weren't all they claimed to be.

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By the time his salesman had doorstepped David,

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Jack Henry was already well known to West Yorkshire Trading Standards.

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There is nothing illegal in the concept of charging people

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for doing a council tax review.

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You can do it for free by yourself, but the concept is not illegal.

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The problem with Jack Henry's business is the quality of the work undertaken.

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In fact, although CTR did put thousands of claims for council tax rebates through the system,

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most were so poorly filled out, they were rejected by the council immediately.

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But Jack Henry lied to his customers, telling them that their claims had been accepted

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and promising they would receive rebates within six to eight weeks.

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By early December 2011, almost three months after he was doorstepped by their salesman,

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David had forked out £310 in fees to CTR

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and there was still no sign of his £4,000 council tax rebate.

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As Christmas was approaching, I thought the time is up now,

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I will ring CTR in a pleasant manner to ask them what the position is with the cash, etcetera.

0:22:370:22:42

I rang them and the gentleman was quite friendly and said,

0:22:420:22:46

"It has been passed, but it's been held up in Halifax.

0:22:460:22:50

"We need the go-ahead from them, but it should come through imminently."

0:22:500:22:54

At least David managed to get through to Jack Henry's sales team. Others were not so lucky.

0:22:540:22:59

Many customers chased him up, only to be fobbed off

0:22:590:23:03

or given various excuses why their work was making no progress.

0:23:030:23:07

Initial complaints were that they could not get through to Mr Henry,

0:23:070:23:11

that the six to eight-week period had been far exceeded and they could no longer make contact with him.

0:23:110:23:17

At this point, it's estimated that Jack Henry was turning over up to £900,000 a year

0:23:170:23:23

in payments from his mostly elderly and vulnerable customers,

0:23:230:23:27

but this con merchant's luck was about to run out.

0:23:270:23:30

After logging hundreds of complaints against CTR from disgruntled customers,

0:23:300:23:36

police and Trading Standards moved in.

0:23:360:23:39

Jack Darrell Henry was arrested on July 12th, 2010, by the West Yorkshire Police.

0:23:390:23:44

He was interviewed at Huddersfield Police Station by myself and a police officer.

0:23:440:23:49

The arrest related to a complaint made by a 93-year-old victim

0:23:490:23:53

who was being pursued for a further £95 by Mr Henry's sales team.

0:23:530:23:57

Ironically, Mr Henry had succeeded in re-banding her property.

0:23:570:24:02

After many months and repeated assurances from CTR that his claim had been accepted,

0:24:020:24:07

David Platt was still waiting to receive his £4,000 rebate.

0:24:070:24:12

It was only when he saw a headline about Jack Henry's arrest in his local paper that the penny dropped.

0:24:120:24:18

Initially, when I read the article in The Examiner, it was a shock.

0:24:180:24:23

I had believed in CTR all along.

0:24:230:24:25

I'd paid my money on demand, I got a telephone call saying I was passed.

0:24:250:24:29

I was really, really disappointed. I must admit that I thought I'd probably lost my money.

0:24:290:24:36

But I'm going to fight all I can to see if I can get something back.

0:24:360:24:40

Although poor David is still £310 out of pocket,

0:24:400:24:44

the case against Jack Henry involves around 5,000 victims,

0:24:440:24:48

all of whom paid fees to CTR for rebates they simply never received.

0:24:480:24:53

It all adds up to a staggering doorstep con trick worth hundreds of thousands of pounds,

0:24:530:24:59

but at least the rogue responsible might think twice before scamming anybody again.

0:24:590:25:04

In January 2012, Jack Henry received a nine-month prison sentence, suspended for 12 months,

0:25:050:25:12

plus 150 hours of unpaid community work.

0:25:120:25:15

The pursuit of compensation for Henry's victims is ongoing,

0:25:150:25:19

but one thing is for sure - David has learnt his lesson.

0:25:190:25:22

To trust that person, I was very angry with myself.

0:25:220:25:26

I should have made further enquiries, then perhaps arranged a future date to meet him again.

0:25:260:25:31

That's what I should have done and that's what everybody else should do.

0:25:310:25:36

If you are contacted out of the blue by a trader who offers you thousands in return for an up-front fee,

0:25:360:25:42

we advise you not to do business with them.

0:25:420:25:45

Don't allow them in the house. Even if they are offering a genuine service, we advise you

0:25:450:25:51

to shop around and get quotes from alternative suppliers.

0:25:510:25:55

If you need advice on any consumer matter, ring Consumer Direct.

0:25:550:25:59

I think you'll agree - a great, great result.

0:26:000:26:03

Now, before we go, enough time to read you a really positive email from Marion Lewis of Leicestershire.

0:26:030:26:09

The neighbourhood watch group she set up in 2002 is now ten years old.

0:26:090:26:14

In that time, they've been to see more than 2,000 households.

0:26:140:26:18

Marion says they've reduced the number of distraction burglaries

0:26:180:26:22

from 36 per year down to just one in the last 12 months.

0:26:220:26:26

I think that is terrific news, so thanks for getting in touch, Marion. Good stuff.

0:26:260:26:31

We're here to fight back against doorstep criminals

0:26:310:26:35

and we'd love to hear more of your stories about how you've stopped them ripping you off.

0:26:350:26:40

Find the details about how to get in touch with us at:

0:26:400:26:44

Thanks for being with us today

0:26:440:26:46

and clearly I hope you'll join me again next time.

0:26:460:26:50

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