A judge trying to assess how much money conman Mark Acklom has made in his criminal career told the fraudster he did not “have it in” for him.
Acklom, 51, who was jailed for five years for a notorious romance scam, claimed the judge was biased against him and should be replaced.
Judge Martin Picton, who jailed Acklom in 2019, refused to stand down and after more than two hours of legal argument adjourned the case for a new two-day hearing at Bristol Crown Court.
Acklom, who was freed after serving less than half his sentence, listened in to the session from Spain where he lives with his family, but did not contribute.
He was imprisoned after admitting he wooed divorcee Carolyn Woods and conned her into giving him £300,000.
He claimed he was a wealthy banker and MI6 agent, promised to marry her, isolated her from her family and friends and vanished after a year, leaving her penniless and suicidal.
She said he stole a total of £850,000 from her and is still hoping she will get some of it back at the end of the long-running Proceeds of Crime Act confiscation hearing.
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Acklom’s lawyer Martin Sharpe told the court it was difficult to assess how much Acklom got from Ms Woods because the money he stole was channelled through the bank account of an associate, Paul Kaur, who used some of it himself.
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Mr Sharpe said Mr Kaur had been asked to co-operate with the defence but had not done so and could not be forced to give evidence.
The lawyer also said the prosecution had failed to pursue people Acklom had given money to, allegedly including his Spanish father-in-law.
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In a previous hearing, the prosecution said it believed Acklom, who was first jailed when he was 18, had profited by at least £1.3m during his criminal career.
The judge said: “The prosecution have investigated this case and I have said before that this money is vanishingly unlikely ever to be collected.”
