Widow begged charity to pay for soldier husband’s funeral after fraudster conned him out life savings

A widow had to go to a charity to pay for her soldier husband’s funeral after a fraudster who lied about being a lawyer conned him out of their life savings.

Agnes Hewitt lied to army veteran George Ross that she would win him £500,000 from an employment dispute but ended up stealing more than £50,000 from him and demanded £10,000 more as he lay sick in hospital.

And Hewitt also managed to con a couple of out £140,000 of their personal money - as she promised them millions from a legal case.

The 63-year-old from Bellshill, Lanarkshire was last month jailed for three years following a trial in which she was found guilty of obtaining £192,649 by fraud between January 2012 and December 2018.

But the impact on her victims from her scheming and fake claims of being a powerful lawyer can be revealed by the Sunday Mail.

George’s wife Agnes Ross bravely contacted police when she overhead Hewitt on the phone to him in hospital asking for £10,000.

The 69-year-old said: “He was crying down the phone to her saying ‘you’ve bled me dry.’

“I knew something wasn’t right, I shouted on a nurse and told her to ring the police.

“She took everything he had.

“After he died I didn’t even have enough money to bury him.

“I will never forgive that woman for what she did. Not only did she rob us of our life savings, she robbed me of my husband. If she hadn’t put so much pressure on George, I believe he would still be here today.”

Police later discovered Hewitt had cheated George, who’d been fighting dementia, out of £52,684.

She told him an employment dispute he’d had with the Royal British Legion had settled for £501,000.

But George, of Dalkeith, Midlothian, who left the army in 1993 and worked for the Legion for 25 years, died in 2019 before he could see justice done.

Armed forces charity SSAFA, Poppy Scotland and the DWP contributed to George’s £2000 funeral costs.

Agnes said: “She knew he had dementia.

“She was taking money off George for a tribunal that didn’t even exist.

“She lied about everything, she even lied about her own husband being dead.

“Now my house is falling down around me and I can’t afford the repairs. She stole everything we had.”

The Sunday Mail has discovered how Hewitt listed herself as a ‘solicitor’ on her marriage certificate in 2018 but has never been on the roll of Scottish solicitors under her maiden or married name.

It is a criminal offence to falsely claim to be a solicitor.

In 2017, Hewitt, formerly an advocate of Peninsula Business Services of Manchester appeared at Hamilton Sheriff Court and admitted embezzling £11,000 from her employers between April 2012 and March 2013.

She had been accused of embezzling £16,360 but pleaded guilty to an amended charge and was ordered to carry out 120 hours’ unpaid work.

Hewitt met Michael Dooley, from Bathgate, West Lothian, via Peninsula when he was involved in a dispute with another director at his firm.

After the tribunal was settled and the case won, Hewitt then told Michael that the other director had breached a legal agreement by making threats and further court action would have to be taken.

She said he had launched an intellectual property case against the firm and convinced him to pay legal costs out of his own pocket.

Michael, 55, said: “She had left Peninsula but could assist us.

“I paid her £500 to start proceedings but costs then grew and grew. She was very convincing and sent fake paperwork, named lawyers, legal process, judges and was knew what she was talking about.

“What supposedly started at the sheriff court ended up at the Court of Session court where she enlisted a barrister and needed money for that.

“We were told the other side would have to pay £350,000 and it was guaranteed.

“In the end she told us we were owed £3.6milion.”

No money materialised which led Michael and wife Clare - who run Strathkelvin Instruments Ltd - to became suspicious.

They went to courts in Edinburgh but were told no case existed.

Clare found an online article which outed Hewitt as an embezzler and in November 2017 the couple carried out a sting operation and confronted her.

After denying the scam they never heard from her again and contacted police who discovered Hewitt had taken £139,965 from them from December 2013 to November 2017.

Mum-of-three Clare, 51, said: “She bombarded us with phone calls and called Michael at length every day for seven years, there was no let up, no escape.

“Whenever we wanted to drop the case, she would say ‘it’s for your kids. You owe it to them to secure their future. Every single spare penny, we had and sometimes didn’t have, she wanted.

“Hewitt told us multiple stories about her husband neeeding a heart transplant, where he was ready for a new heart but at the last minute it wasn’t viable.

“It has been horrendous, the stress and heartache she has caused.”

After Hewitt was convicted last month, Sheriff Linda Nicolson (CORR) called her conduct “parasitic and deplorable’.

A spokeswoman for Peninsula said Hewitt was employed as a legal services consultant but not as a solicitor and was suspended when the allegations were made.

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