'Playboy' financial adviser at centre of £4.1m fraud must repay £1k

A "playboy" financial adviser who conned friends out of £4.1m only has to forfeit the money he had on him when he was arrested, a judge has ruled.

Neil Bartlett, 54, who was jailed in December, used bogus investment schemes to pay for gambling and prostitutes.

His only asset was the £1,015 he had in his pocket when he returned to the UK, Liverpool Crown Court was told.

Making the ruling, Judge Brian Cummings said: "I very much regret there is so little available, but there it is."

Bartlett, of Ainsdale, refused to appear at Friday's hearing, which was told he admitted taking £4,148,675 from his victims in 28 fraud offences.

A police spokeswoman said he had claimed to be investing pensions and life savings from his victims, but was actually using the money to fly to New York, the Maldives and Russia.

He also spent £180,000 on two particular escorts.

Bartlett was arrested when he returned to Manchester Airport from Russia in November after spending all of the money on hotels and sex workers.

Sentencing him to eight years in prison in December, Judge Alan Conrad said he had been "maintaining a playboy lifestyle with expensive prostitutes and luxury foreign travel".

At the confiscation hearing, prosecutor Philip Astbury said Bartlett's former employer had placed a "restriction" on his marital home on Delamere Road, so it could not be sold.

Speaking afterwards, a spokesman for Merseyside Police said the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 "allows for the court to reconsider the available amount... after a confiscation order is made".

This could include "future remuneration, inheritances [or] gambling wins", he added.