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More on KentOnline
A daughter swiped £90,000 from her sick father to spend on lingerie, luxurious hotels and jewellery, including thousands in Pandora.
Fiona Dorman 37, stole the cash from her dad Alan after he sold his home to pay for round-the-clock care with assisted living after being taken unwell with pneumonia.
The pensioner, 83, suffered a catastrophic blow to his finances after his daughter started syphoning off the cash after taking control of his money and spending it on luxury items.
However, a care manager at Sevington Mill Care Home in Willesbourough sounded the alarm when the pensioner racked up a £26,000 debt when his payments dried up.
The revelation ignited a two-pronged investigation into Dorman, where Kent Police and Kent County Council unearthed the extent of her thievery.
“(Investigators) found the money from the sale of the house had been spent in a six month period,” prosecutor Craig Evans explained.
In fact, only £7 remained from the house sale after her shopping binge, which included fashion shops, hotels, trains and giving £10,000 to friend ‘Catherine’.
Various transactions were made in lingerie chain Ann Summers, Peacocks, Pizza Express and Pandora.
A total of £7,000 was shelled out at the popular high street jewellery store in Eastbourne, with £3,500 of that going in just one day.
Hotel bills racked up to the thousands; £2,121 went on Brighton’s Grand Hotel, payments went to lodgings in Folkestone, Eastbourne and Torquay in Devon.
Various transactions were also made to train firms and £10,000 was transferred to her friend ‘Catherine’, as her father remained helpless.
Now Dorman has been jailed for two years and seven months, at Canterbury Crown Court after admitting theft.
Her father told the court the “catastrophic” consequences had jeapordised his home, but he asserted he still loves his daughter.
He said: “I’m shocked and saddened by what has happened. She knew the money was meant to be for my care and I can’t think of any reason she would have spent it.
“I love my daughter, I didn’t raise Fiona to behave like this - I’m heartbroken.”
But Dorman’s barrister Ronnie Manek explained the two were now on speaking terms, seeking to make amends.
Mr Manek explained Dorman was homeless, ‘lost in her way’ and gripped by outside influences at the time of her offending in 2016.
'I love my daughter, I didn’t raise Fiona to behave like this - I’m heartbroken...'
Yet she had cleaned up her act in accommodated living while working 42-hours a week at a charity shop, explained Mr Manek, who also highlighted the pressures on the prison system mid-pandemic.
Dorman spoke only to confirm her name and also admitted breaching a suspended sentence order for a previous arson offence.
Judge O’Mahony told Dorman she must be jailed for 31-months for the “severe breach of trust” against an elderly man who was not well.
He added: "Funds he needed, money he no doubt worked hard for to save, and it was all the more bitter for him that the thief was his own daughter.”
Dorman, now of Drove Road in Brighton, was also fined £100 for breaching the suspended sentence, her only previous conviction.
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