Mark Killick had managed to scam customers out of over £1million to fund his life of luxury and gambling habit before he was eventually dobbed in and arrested by police
One of Britain’s worst “cowboy builders” has been arrested after conning the public out of over £1.25million. He used the money to fund a life of luxury, as well as pay for gambling flutters galore.
Mark Killick, disguising himself as Mark Cole, took payments from customers knowing that he would not be giving them the services they needed. But after two years worth of dodging angry customers, police were finally able to close in on him and bring him down.
Dramatic footage of the arrest shows the moment that the “serial fraudster” was eventually detained by police. He has since faced a 14-week trial and has been found guilty of 37 different counts.
Appearing before Bristol Crown Court, a jury found that he had committed offences across the 37 victims he had fleeced, taking in approximately £1.47million in payments to fund a lavish lifestyle and gamble with no issues. This was also coupled with the total value of the work that was not done by Mark across the numerous customers he accrued, being £1.27million.
Initially, Mark had seemed to go under the radar, but it was only after he had racked up over 100 complaints that he was charged with fraud by false representation between 2019 and 2021. The total amount of money accrued was equivalent to that of a “lottery win”, his trial heard.
During the trial, the court heard how Killick would ask that customers pay huge sums of cash upfront in order for him to pay for materials he would supposedly use on the job. He would then pester clients for the money as he needed the money “urgently” to get to work as quickly as possible.
However, unbeknownst to his customers, Killick was making the money through a “ponzi scheme”, using the money he earned to fund work for customers he had fobbed off months prior. On top of this, he was also accused of failing to pay suppliers and contractors — only making the company’s liabilities worse.
What made matters even worse for his clients was that they were unaware of the criminal record Killick had racked up between 2008 and 2014 for the same crime of fraud. Throughout both instances, he had used fake names in order to cover his tracks and avoid being detected.
According to his testimony, Mark had gone bankrupt at some point in 2000s, before officially changing his name by deed poll back in January of 2019, before launching his new business one month later. At the end of the trial, Mark was convicted of 37 out of 46 offences, with his sentencing set to take place on December 22.
Speaking after the case, Detective Sergeant Louise Sinclair from Avon and Somerset Police said that Mark had “sold his customers a housing redevelopment dream”, but then left them out of pocket by thousands of pounds. “It was fraud on an eye-watering scale,” she explained.
“The change of name prevented any of Killick’s customers who researched his credentials from seeing the media reports of his previous fraud convictions,” she added. “He is a serial fraudster.”
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