A Jail sentence of more than three years awaits a man who admitted defrauding 19 people - many of them close friends and family.

The majority of Julian Clark's victims were friends, business colleagues and family members from Maidstone, Cranbrook and Tonbridge.

Maidstone Crown Court heard Clark (pictured) managed to obtain more than £700,000 from his victims over three years, between November 2006 and December 2009. He was charged with 21 counts of fraud and two counts of obtaining money by deception, but two counts of obtaining money by deception were ordered to lie on file.

He borrowed substantial sums of money from them by claiming that he could either purchase bankrupt gymnasium equipment, high value part exchange vehicles from Land Rover dealerships or export motocross bikes to Belgium and Holland, in order to sell them on at a profit.

In each case he offered interest on the money borrowed and promised a quick turnaround. But he failed to repay the money, using it to provide an income and pay back loans.

Whenever pressure was put on Clark by one victim, he lied to a new victim in order to partly or wholly repay the first victim. Clark had also been sentenced to six months in prison back in 2001 for a series of identical fraud offences.

The defendant had been a motocross rider but had a serious accident when he was 27. After that he moved into personal fitness training and later into professional cycling and running the Linda McCartney Pro Cycling Team.

Of the £737,000 he managed to defraud, Clark, of Levett Road, Leatherhead, Surrey, did pay back just over £400,000 leaving under half outstanding.

In sentencing Clark to three-and-a-half years, the judge gave him credit for pleading guilty at the first opportunity but said "that he was satisfied that whilst initially there was some genuine business dealing very quickly it developed into fraud and dishonest behaviour. The genuine business element was not as Clark sought to put forward."

DC Steve Payne of Kent Police’s commercial crime team said: "This was a long and complex case and I am pleased that this serial conman has finally been brought to bear for his crimes. He targeted his closest friends and family, in some cases taking their life savings, which will have an impact on them for years to come. I hope that this sentence gives them some sense of closure."