Terry O’Connor, 33, of Swansea, has been jailed for five years and three months after he admitted to defrauding his own family of £200,000 and fleeing to Turkey for almost a year. The fraudulent scheme was uncovered when his grandfather attempted to withdraw cash and discovered his £80,000 life savings had been nearly emptied.
How the fraud was carried out
O’Connor secretly set up phone and online banking for his parents, siblings, and grandfather, then spent five years siphoning money into his own account. Bank statements revealed the funds had been paid into his parents’ accounts before being transferred out again. A police investigation found that O’Connor had posed as his relatives to steal money and funnel it through their accounts to his own.
Swansea Crown Court heard that he stole £79,659 from his grandfather, £84,094 from his parents, £29,353 from his brother, and £8,241 from his sister. The total amounted to £201,347.
Flight and arrest
After the theft was discovered, O’Connor took a ferry from Dover to France and travelled to Turkey, where he lived for almost a year. He flew back to the UK in April and was arrested at Gatwick Airport. The court was told that his grandfather’s bank fully repaid the stolen money, while his brother’s bank repaid half of what was taken. The other family members have lost everything.
O’Connor’s grandfather has since passed away. In a family statement, his father described the situation as “very painful and very embarrassing for the family” and said he did not want to spend more time thinking about what his son had done.
Family impact and sentencing
The father said: “For what he did to my father and the rest of us, I can never forgive him. We are an honest, hardworking family – he seems happy to take what he can from others around him. What he has done to our family is unforgivable.”
He also noted that O’Connor posted derogatory comments about the family on social media and later wrote to his mother from prison to apologise. The father added: “I do believe he was sorry – but not for us. He is sorry he is in prison. He wasn’t sorry when he was stealing from us every day for five years.”
O’Connor pleaded guilty to fraud by false representation and possession of criminal property. His partner, Chelsea Myles, 26, of Llansamlet, admitted possession of criminal property. Judge Huw Rees called O’Connor a “thoroughly dishonest individual” who had defrauded his own family before adopting a “cowardly stance” when police became involved and fleeing. He added: “Your behaviour was unforgivable.”
O’Connor was jailed for five years and three months. Myles received a 12-month prison sentence, suspended for 18 months. Judge Rees commended the police investigation, noting the lack of co-operation from O’Connor.
