Bed mechanic swindled dementia sufferer of £112k

A bed mechanic scammed £112,000 from an elderly woman living at one of London’s most prestigious hotels by charging her for unnecessary work on her motorised mattress.

Raj Ganpat, 55, fleeced Judith Novak at Mayfair’s Athenaeum Hotel and Residences, where rooms start at £500 per night to fund his gambling addiction.

He pretended to be servicing her electric adjustable bed, charging her thousands of pounds on 31 occasions over five years.

Ms Novak, who suffers from dementia, did not realise what was happening until hotel staff caught her giving him an £8,240 cheque in 2019.

Ganpat also scammed Jeremy Steene at his home In Hertfordshire in 2017, saying he had replaced the motor in his bed and attempting to charge him £2,250.

Mr Steene gave him £1,000 in cash and said he would pay the rest at a later date.

In 2015, whilst he was scamming Ms Novak between April 2014 and October 2019, he received a suspended sentence for a separate fraud.

Prosecutor Judith Benson said: ‘Judith had a high end motorised bed, with an electronic mechanism that raises it and puts it back in place.

‘Mr Ganpat had been a mechanic working for the makers of the bed.

‘He was visiting Ms Novak repeatedly in the hotel between 2014 and 2019 purporting to service the bed.

‘Evidence from the manager of the shop shows there was no need to service the bed.

‘Whilst he was there for less than 10 minutes each time she was being invoiced by him, using the headed paper of the company, for thousands of pounds.

‘In 2019, staff in the hotel became suspicious and went into the room and realised she’d handed over a £8,240 pound cheque.

‘Over the years she had provided a total of £112,000 over 31 different cheques.’

Ms Benson said Ms Novak had received the money back from her bank.

She said: ‘In 2017 Mr Ganapt was working for Rested who had supplied a bed to Mr Steene.

‘He attended his address to service the bed but was under the instruction not to do any work to the bed without the instruction of the manager.

‘Mr Ganpat told Mr Steene the bed needed a new motor and this would cost £2,250.

‘Mr Steene said he didn’t have that but provided £1,000 in cash and agreed to pay the remainder at a later date.

‘Ganpat went to his van, took a box from the van, and purported to replace the motor.’

After talking to his wife, Mr Steene became suspicious about the amount he’d been charged and telephoned the company.

The manager phoned Ganpat who then vanished, and he was not spoken to by police until he was arrested for defrauding Ms Novak in 2019.

In a victim impact statement Mr Steene said he felt angry, exploited and stupid.

Defence lawyer Michelle Denney argued for a suspended sentence, saying Ganpat suffered from kidney failure and had received a transplant in December.

She said it was critical for him to receive medical care over the next few months to see if his body would accepted or reject the kidney.

He attended walking with a stick and wearing a blue surgical mask and large green coat in the warm courtroom.

Ganpat, of Beaconsfield Road, Edmonton, admitted two charges of fraud by false representation.

He will be sentened this afternoon.

Ganpat was later jailed for three years and four months.

The court heard he had three previous convictions for fraud for which he had received two periods of imprisonment and one suspended sentence.

The judge, Recorder Nicholas Medcroft, KC, said: ‘Ms Judith Novak was an elderly vulnerable woman with dementia and you took advantage of her and duped her into writing a large number of cheques.

‘You were taking advantage of your knowledge about this bed having worked for the manufacturer, but most of all you were taking advantage of her vulnerability.

‘You were admitted to her room on the basis that you were someone seeking to genuinely service the bed.

‘You took advantage of that and built up a relationship with her, and that amounts to an abuse of power.

‘In regards to Mr Steene you were genuinely there to service his bed in accordance with your employment but once there you took advantage of the situation.

‘You should have charged him £80 but duped him into parting with £1,000 cash and the expectation of further cash the next day.’

Judge Medcroft said there was no evidence Ganpat’s kidney could not be appropriately monitored in prison but did reduce the sentence to reflect his ill health.

Ms Denney said that Ganpat had begun gambling while having marital difficulties with his wife and that he wanted to provide for his daughter following their separation.