A convicted murderer who stole of £120,000 from his mother-in-law’s estate has avoided jail after a court heard he could pay the full amount back with interest.
Ivan Downes – who was jailed for life in England in 1992 – had already been recalled to prison on licence due to his dishonest actions and, as a result, had served 13 months in custody before the case even made it to court.
Noting this, along with the fact that Downes recently came into an unspecified windfall, Sheriff Ian Cruickshank handed out a compensation order and fine totalling £219,000.
At his trial, Downes had initially entered a special defence of incrimination – blaming his late wife, who held power of attorney for her mother, for the crime.
But following evidence from the executor of Downe’s victim estate – who discovered the missing money – he pled guilty to an amended charge at Inverness Sheriff Court in May of this year.
The 73-year-old admitted the theft, between 2007 and 2013, of just under half of the £241,000 originally libelled against him.
At that hearing, fiscal depute Emily Hood told the sheriff that Downes’ wife, Linda, was appointed power of attorney when her mother, Gwendoline Smith, was admitted to Greenhill Care Home in Barnet in August 2007 after having had a stroke.
“Her home in Potters Bar was sold for £345,382.37 and from that £130,000 was paid upfront to the care home, with £200,000 invested in her name.
Victim wanted money ‘to stay where it was’
“During her stay, she had a disagreement with Ivan and Linda Downes over the signing of a cheque for £100,000 and told staff she wanted her money to stay where it was in her accounts and investments.
“Over £200,000 was paid to the care home over six years and other monies spent with her permission, but this did not cover £120,000. She died on January 4, 2013.”
The court was told that her daughter-in-law, Wilhelmina Smith, had been appointed executor of Mrs Smith’s will, leaving her money to her four grandchildren.
When probate was granted allowing Wilhelmina to make enquiries into Gwendoline’s affairs, she expected to find a significant amount of money in her two bank accounts.
However, only £7.98 was left, Ms Hood told the court.
She added that 300 cash withdrawals, mostly of the maximum daily amount of £300, had recorded across the UK, including Inverness, Nairn, Elgin and Wick, with 169 from machines in Buckie, where the Downes lived for a spell.
“£120,000 had been withdrawn without explanation,” Ms Hood said.
The Downes were interviewed by police in 2015 and Ivan Downes accepted he was mostly in control of the money and that his wife had little to do with financial matters.
Downes also admitted previous convictions going back as far as 1967, including one for murder and others for larceny, theft and dishonesty.
Thief’s ‘mean-spirited’ offence
At the sentencing hearing defence agent David Nicolson conceded that his client’s offence was “mean-spirited” but told the court the 73-year-old widower was assessed as being at “low risk of reoffending”.
Mr Nicolson clarified that Downes himself had not sought to blame his late wife for the crime.
The incrimination defence, he explained, had been lodged at the insistence of Downes legal team as there were transactions on the woman’s accounts that his client was unaware of and unable to explain.
“Those funds must have moved with the consent of the power of attorney,” Mr Nicolson added.
He told the court that Downes’ financial circumstances “changed rapidly in March of this year”.
The reason for the change was not said in court, but Mr Nicolson said it allowed his client to set aside £168,000 in anticipation of a ruling for compensation of the £120,000 plus a further £48,000 that a firm of accountants had assessed as fair interest.
But Sheriff Cruickshank said that, given the delay, it was only fair any compensation should include an interest payment of five per cent per annum.
The sheriff called the crime a “calculated course of dishonest conduct” and that “quite an impact” on the family.
Compensation order and a fine
He said “As a result of that, by the date of Mrs Smith’s death, you had stolen from her £120,000 that should have formed part of the estate – the theft deprived her beneficiaries of that sum.
“Eleven-and-a-half years later I’m told you are in a position to repay the sums taken.”
He ordered Downes to pay compensation of £189,000 to be distributed to the beneficiaries of Mrs Smith’s estate – and a further £5,000 to compensate the executor herself, including for costs incurred in tracing Downes.
Sheriff Cruickshank said that since Downes had “effectively served just over a year in custody” he would impose a financial penalty and fined the pensioner £25,000.
Downes, of Woodroffe Street, Forres, was given 28 days to make full payment of £219,000.
