Notorious fraudster Mark Acklom who posed as MI6 agent ordered to pay £125,000
Acklom, 52, who now lives in Spain, was been ordered to pay his victim the large sum after a hearing at Bristol Crown Court.
A notorious British fraudster who conned an ex-girlfriend out of her life savings while posing as an MI6 agent and Swiss banker has been ordered to pay her £125,000.
Mark Acklom, 52, previously admitted five counts of fraud against Carolyn Woods, from Gloucestershire, and was sentenced to five years and eight months in prison in 2019.
For more than five years, prosecutors have been using Proceeds of Crime Act (Poca) legislation in an attempt to recover the money stolen from Ms Woods.
On Friday, Bristol Crown Court heard that Acklom, who now lives in Spain with his wife and two children, has been ordered to pay £125,000 or face two years in prison if he does not comply.
It appeared that Acklom was listening to the hearing via videolink, but he did not speak or turn on his camera.
Prosecutor John Hardy KC told the court that the figure by which Acklom benefited from his crimes was £710,000, but the available amount is £125,000.
Judge Martin Picton said: “I’m very grateful to the parties for being able to navigate a way to an agreed position so far as a resolution in these Proceeds of Crime Act proceedings are concerned.”
He added: “At the heart of the case is a victim who has lost a very, very great deal of money.
“Carolyn Woods was drawn into the web of fantasy and deceit.”
The judge said that Acklom “was determined to bleed her dry” and exercised “quite extraordinary powers as a conman”.
Judge Picton added that he has the “greatest doubts” that the money will be recovered, but said that Acklom will effectively be unable to return to the UK because he will fear the consequences of prison time if he does.
During his relationship with Ms Woods, Acklom claimed he was friends with celebrities including Nicky Clarke and Chris Evans, had spoken to Hillary Clinton and knew fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld, and was involved with secret MI6 missions.
Acklom duped Ms Woods into lending him her life savings by misleading her into thinking they were in a “committed relationship” despite him already being married.
The conman – using the alias of Mark Conway – accepted a marriage proposal from Ms Woods in February 2012, just one month after they met in a boutique in Tetbury where she worked.
He duped her into lending him £299,564 of her life savings in 2012 for renovation work at a number of properties in Bath, Somerset, as well as to buy a Porsche and rent a Georgian manor in the city.
He later left the country and was named as one of the UK’s most wanted fugitives as part of Operation Captura, a multi-agency initiative involving the National Crime Agency and Crimestoppers to track down British fugitives abroad.
The serial conman was later tracked down to Switzerland and extradited back to Britain in 2019, when he was jailed.
When he was sentenced that year, Ms Woods, a divorced mother of two, said she suffered “total financial ruin” and had been hounded by debt collection agencies after cashing in her pension and using savings to pay her bills.
In a victim impact statement at the time, Ms Woods said she suffered with post-traumatic stress disorder, calling Acklom’s crimes an “act of the utmost cruelty, designed to destroy my life for his personal gain”.
Acklom was extradited to Spain in 2021 – having fled the country in 2016 midway through a fraud sentence – and served a further two years in prison before his release in 2023.
In 1991, Acklom, then aged 16, received a four-year custodial sentence for a £466,000 mortgage fraud after he posed as a City stockbroker.
He also spent £11,000 after stealing his father’s credit card, swindled a former teacher out of £13,000 and ran up a £34,000 bill with a private charter jet company.
