A 35-year-old man from Winschoten has been sentenced to three years in prison for defrauding twelve people in Drenthe, Groningen and Friesland. Two weeks ago, the Public Prosecution Service (OM) demanded a year and a half in prison, but the judge found that too low a sentence.
De Winschoter pretended to be a contractor, took down payments and then went missing. He defrauded his victims for nearly a quarter of a million. The money was mainly spent on hotels, designer clothes, an expensive car, jewelry, amusement parks and fast food.
The man was active from February 2021 in Tynaarlo, Westdorp, Hoogezand and Tytsjerk, among others. People approached him via the website werkspot.nl and received a quote from him. In some cases, the man misused the name of a reputable construction company.
After agreement, he urged the customer to make a deposit within seven days. The man actually carried out a few jobs, but the execution was so bad that it had to be demolished again later.
The reports rolled in and the Winschoter was arrested in January. The judge imposed a higher sentence on him, because sitting for a year and a half does not do justice to the amount of serious offenses and the persistence with which they were committed.
The man was also sentenced for falsifying documents to claim earthquake damage and tax fraud. The thirty-year-old must repay the victims a total of more than 235,000 euros.