EBay conman was 'addicted' to scam

Phillip Shortman had all the trappings of the playboy lifestyle. When the whim took him, the designer-clad teenager would hire a limousine or jet off to New York with friends, where they stayed in five-star hotels and took helicopter rides over Manhattan.

What he didn't have, though, was a salary to match.

The unemployed 18-year-old from south Wales paid for his lavish existence by conning more than 100 users of the internet auction site eBay out of £45,000 (€66,000).

He also liked to taunt his victims, telling one: "This is my business - I make people fools."

By the time police caught up with him, all he had left after his spending spree was a little over £600.

This week, a judge at Cardiff crown court sentenced him to 12 months' detention and training, saying: "The public are entitled to protection from someone such as yourself."

Shortman, of New Inn, Pontypool, Wales, had earlier admitted 21 counts of obtaining property by deception.

The court heard how, for just over a year, Shortman used eBay to advertise electrical goods that did not exist. When the online auction closed, he would contact his victims to let them know they had won.

After they got in touch with him, usually by phone or e-mail, he would ask them to put the money they had bid into a bank account.

But the goods they thought they had bought never materialised.

"The victims would never see the cash again," said Stuart McLeese, prosecuting.

Despite being arrested and put on police bail, Shortman carried on targeting eBay users because he had become "addicted" to his scam, the court heard.

He was eventually given bail only on condition that he did not use the internet.

Shortman's barrister, Lawrence Jones, said his client had few friends and had used the money to buy friendship.

Sentencing Shortman, Judge Denyer said the accused had carried out a "persistent course of criminal conduct" for which an adult could receive a three-year sentence.

Ebay issued a statement this week, apologising to those who had been defrauded by Shortman.

It added: "Online fraud is unfortunately an industry-wide issue but this case demonstrates how the transparency of eBay enables us to collaborate with the police to identify fraudulent activity and ultimately crack down on internet crime."