Disabled Walsall fraudster 'tricked victims'

Despite his physical problems, Burt Ledsam was an intelligent man, the court heard. However he selected victims who were not only deaf and mute but also had learning difficulties.

The 22-year-old forced a deaf man to withdraw a total of £3,500 in five days last July from a bank in Walsall after punching and threatening him, Stafford Crown Court heard. Ledsam was seen on CCTV twice accompanying the 57-year-old victim who had to travel to the branch on a mobility scooter from his nearby home in Bloxwich.

He also tricked two deaf women with learning difficulties out of around £1,800 by posing as a support worker. He told the first, aged 60, that he was arranging new accommodation for her and needed money to pay for wallpaper and other fittings at the non-existent flat. He had met her at a club for the deaf in Walsall.

She handed over money on eight separate occasions between January and June last year with a total of £1,500 involved in the fraud, said Miss Sharon Bahia, prosecuting.

Another woman, aged 54, gave a further £290 over three visits.

Ledsam had previously claimed that the money had been given to him freely by his victims but changed his plea to guilty on all four charges on the first day of his trial.

The case was adjourned until yesterday for a probation report. Mr Gurdeep Garcha, defending, said the amounts involved had been relatively small and that Ledsam now took responsibility for his offending.

Ledsam, of Latches Close, Darlaston, admitted two counts of fraud and two of robbery. After already serving eight months in jail on remand, he had been warned he faced up to three years behind bars.

But he was saved further time in prison when the judge handed him a two-year sentence suspended for two years. Recorder Stephen Linehan QC said Ledsam's disability had allowed him to move with ease among the deaf community and target them as his victims.Ledsam was also made the subject of a two-year supervision order.