SERIAL fraudster Ben Millin, from Yeovil, has been jailed after stealing thousands of pounds in romance scams targeting women online.

Millin, of Roping Road, has been sentenced to almost three years behind bars after a admitting he fabricated stories of dying relatives, frozen bank accounts, job interviews and severe health conditions to scam women out of money.

Four women were defrauded out of an estimated £30,000 to 40,000, with a large amount of the money being used to fund his gambling habits.

Taunton Crown Court, sitting in North Somerset, heard how the 32-year-old met Fiona in July 2021 and told her early on in their relationship several heartbreaking stories about his family.

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He also claimed he had money issues because of a dispute with an ex-partner regarding a house they were selling, who he claimed had become pregnant after being unfaithful – and asked his victim to help him pay bills, travel expenses and more, promising to pay her back.

The lies came to a head in April 2022, when he promised Fiona to take her to Spain for a holiday. He changed the destination to London – falsely claiming a heart condition would prevent him from flying.

She packed for the trip to London and waited at home, while he went to a job interview in Bristol early, before he would return and they set off for London. At that point she did not know she would never hear from him again.

That evening Fiona was worried when she could not get hold of Millin after the interview and called hospitals and the police to report him missing.

However, Millin’s appointment that day was not a job interview, instead he was in court, jailed for fraud by false representation against an ex-partner.

It was only when Fiona saw the sentencing in the news that she realised she too was a victim, and the true extent of Ben’s lies and deceit completely shook her world.

Within six months of being released from prison in December 2022, Millin started communicating with Charlotte via Instagram. Their relationship grew and he told Charlotte he was earning £40,000 a year as a self-employed sales consultant.

Over the next seven months he lied to her about financial issues and told her he had booked a holiday to Costa Rica for them both after winning £30,000 on a scratch card.

Whenever Charlotte sought some of the money back, Millin would make up stories of health issues for him and family members to win her sympathy.

In total, he stole around £20,000 from Charlotte – money she had largely inherited from her father after he died a few years earlier.

The resultant police investigation found that between June and October 2023 Millin spent an average of £5,500 a month on an online gambling site. He also had taken credit cards out in Charlotte’s name, and their landlady, Sophie, who lived with the couple for several months and thought she could trust Millin – until she realised what he had done days after she left to go travelling. Sophie said her home now is a ‘painful reminder’ of what Ben did and the stress he caused her and Charlotte.

Millin was first arrested in March 2024, but a fortnight earlier he met Chloe, from Bournemouth, through an online dating site, where he falsely claimed to be a psychologist for the Great Britain and Northern Ireland Olympic team, and that he was renovating a recently purchased farmhouse near Dorchester.

During their three-month relationship, he lied to Chloe – telling her he booked holidays to London, Ibiza and Lille.

DC Claire Morgan, officer in the case, said: “Ben Millin preyed on the goodwill of his victims by spinning a web of lies. He tricked them into being sympathetic towards him.

“All the time he was using the money to fund his gambling habits, with seemingly little guilt given how he repeated the fraud against multiple victims.”

In June, Millin was charged with four counts of committing fraud by false representation. Last month, he pleaded guilty at Taunton Crown Court, sitting at North Somerset Courthouse, and was sentenced on Thursday, July 31.

Millin was jailed for 34 months and handed restraining orders preventing him contacting any of the four victims. He was also handed a five-year serious crime prevention order.