A USED CAR salesman has been given a five year suspended sentence for fraudulently converting more than £21,000 to his own use.
Tony Kelly (54), with addresses at Beaconsfield Court, Kilmainham, Dublin, and Woodview Court, Stillorgan, Co Dublin, pleaded guilty to five sample offences on an indictment with 32 similar charges. He had no previous convictions.
Sgt Majella Lynch told Mr Conor Devally, prosecuting, that Kelly had placed advertisements inviting people who wanted to sell their cars to contact him. He met people who replied to him in various parts of the country, collected their cars and sold them, but kept all the proceeds.
The victims in the five sample charges were at a loss variously of cars valued from about £2,000 to £5,500. All the money Kelly received for the cars he had sold was now gone.
Mr Hugh Hartnett, defending, submitted that Kelly's problems arose from depression which set in when he was made redundant from his job as a car salesman after his family life fell apart. His life before he committed these offences had been blameless.
Mr Hartnett said Kelly had declared he wanted to pay back the money he had defrauded. If given his freedom, he would work to earn it.
He had instructed counsel that he had no intention of keeping any of the money. He said he had lent it to a friend who was to invest it, but had not done so. A person he had named to gardai denied Kelly's claim.
Judge Joseph Mathews interjected to ask if this was a case of a con man who was conned by someone else or just another con by the defendant". His declaration of wanting to work to repay his victims did not seen realistic.
When told that Kelly's daughter and son in law had lodged £2,500 cash bail on his behalf, Judge Mathews directed that each of the five victims in the sample charges be paid £500 from it.
Judge Mathews said Kelly had been in jail for over three months and suffered from angina. He had destroyed his life and his family's reputation and was now "a lonely, vulnerable, isolated man" in poor health.
"When he went wrong, he did so in a big way. He took the soft option and fell hard, but I believe he is unlikely to reoffend and I will take a chance by imposing a suspended sentence," Judge Mathews added.