Make an example of conmen (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Make an example of conmen

9:36am Monday 7th May 2012 in Our View By Telegraph & Argus

There is a measure of trust involved in buying used cars that goes beyond what the buyer can see when they view a prospective new purchase.

No-one expects a second-hand vehicle to be of factory-quality, and anyone who has ever bought a used car knows that however clean and well-maintained it looks, things can go wrong.

But it is especially galling when buyers are deliberately conned out of their money through the criminal practice of “clocking”.

This is when unscrupulous dealers effectively wind back the mileage clocks so that the car appears to have a much lower mileage – and can therefore be sold at a higher price – than it really has.

John Geator, a plasterer from Bradford, fell victim to a prolific clocker when he bought a van that he thought had done a reasonable 38,000 miles – but had in fact done almost three times that.

The dealer, Maxwell Stuart Alvey, has thankfully been brought to book and is awaiting sentencing after admitting ten counts of fraudulently wiping what came to millions of miles off the clocks of vehicles.

There is a very real possibility that Alvey will face a long jail sentence, and to Mr Geator and the rest of Alvey’s victims, that will be justice served. Unscrupulous conmen such as this deserve to have the book thrown at them to show anyone else participating in this shady practice that ordinary working people cannot be defrauded out of their hard-earned money in this way.

Perhaps it is also time for the car manufacturers to do their bit by designing anti-fraud mechanisms into their cars to make the job of people such as Alvey a little bit tougher.