Cancer-faking carer who stole £143k from 96-year-old man to splash on lavish holidays avoids prison

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Cancer-faking carer who stole £143k from 96-year-old man to splash on lavish holidays avoids prison

A cancer faking carer who stole £143,000 from a 96-year-old man for lavish holidays to Spain, Barbados, and New York has avoided prison. April Jo Richardson, 32, of Stansted Close, Chelmsford, was found guilty of fraud by abuse of power and fraud by false representation at Inner London Crown Court, but dodged jail with a 20-month sentence suspended for 21 months.

Investigators from City of London Police said Richardson 'spun an intricate web of lies' which included having cancer and desperately needing help while caring for an elderly dementia patient. In one case she posed as a cancer nurse called 'Sonia' and sent a message to the patient's husband pleading for financial aid for the 'last remaining months of her life'.

Richardson was employed by KarePlus, on behalf of Essex County Council, as a carer in 2018. In this capacity she befriended the husband of a patient in her care. The patient suffered a stroke in 2011 and was in advancing stages of dementia, which meant her condition required personal care twice a day.

In July 2022, when it was established that the patient needed to move into a care home on a more permanent basis, her daughter was required to provide Essex County Council with bank statements from the previous three months, to gauge the patient’s financial means in order to fund her residence. It was at this stage that the couple’s children discovered the bank accounts were overdrawn.

Inner London Crown Court stock
Inner London Crown Court in Newington Causeway in South London

After gaining power of attorney in September 2022, the couple’s children were able to access detailed financial information of their parents’ bank accounts. Between September 2018 and July 2022 there were a total of 202 transactions from the couple’s bank account to Richardson, with an average payment of one per week at £718 exceeding £143,000 over a five-year period.

The patient’s husband said he helped Richardson over the years by paying for new beds for her children, a holiday to Spain for a relative, an iPhone and Apple Watch to enable her to seek employment, new flooring, an urgent trip to New York for private medical treatment for cancer and flights to Barbados for her brother’s wedding.

Detective Inspector Nichola Meghji, from the Fraud Operations team, at the City of London Police said: "The case of April Richardson is shocking and highly reprehensible, especially when you consider the age and vulnerability of the couple and the total amount of money that they lost, through their generosity and kindness.

“Nurses, carers and those working in palliative care are some of the hardest working and most selfless people in the country where a lot of people, in need, rely on them. It’s therefore very sad to see this level of trust abused.

“Richardson is an incredibly manipulative individual who coerced an elderly couple to part with their money purely for her financial and material gain.”

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