A dishonest TV aerial repair man convicted of conning customers has been jailed for three years in his absence.
Keith Matthews (59) was found guilty last week, after a trial, of four frauds, eight offences of engaging in unfair commercial practice and one of running fraudulent businesses, One Digital and Aerials Direct, between April 2011 and March last year. He was acquitted of one count of unfair commercial practice.
Matthews failed to attend court for his trial after jumping bail, and is being hunted by police.
After the guilty verdicts were announced last week, Judge Philip Head said Matthews, along with his clothes and passport, had gone missing from his home in Station Road, Quorn.
Matthews overcharged customers and duped householders into having unnecessary work done. One of his victims, an 89-year-old man, of Braunstone, Leicester, ended up paying £4,900 for aerial repairs and "shoddily carried out" labouring odd jobs worth £490.
Leicestershire County Council's trading standards department caught Matthews and his employee, Luke Busby, in a sting operation.
Footage of the trading standards sting:
Busby (26), of Leicester Road, Countesthorpe, who admitted fraud in connection with the sting operation, was given a 12-month community order at the sentencing hearing this morning, with 120 hours of unpaid work, and was ordered to pay £1,080 costs.
After today's hearing, David Bull, head of Leicestershire County Council's trading standards service, said: "Matthews' business activities were shown to be utterly fraudulent.
"Matthews made fraudulent use of the name of a legitimate business owner on his invoices and used various false names when dealing with customers.
"Telephone numbers used on business paperwork and linked to 'pay as you go' mobile phones were regularly changed, to avoid detection."
Pam Posnett, the council's cabinet member for trading standards, said: "Trading standards will continue to take action against those who deliberately mislead consumers by charging for unnecessary work, as we need to protect both consumers and legitimate businesses who lose trade to criminals like these."
Anyone who has any information about Matthews' whereabouts should contact either Leicestershire Police on 101 or trading standards on 08454 040506.
Gary Connors, of Leicester County Council trading standards, talks about the case:
