Crooked accountant Colin Marco, who cheated clients out of £500,000, is behind bars.

But his sentence of four years and ten months came under attack by unlucky investors who attended Basildon Crown Court.

One woman, who parted with £10,000, fumed: "It's disgusting. He should have got at least six years."

Another woman said: "He is low life and deserved to get a much longer sentence. We are the real losers."

Marco, 60, who ran his business from Hamlet Court Road, Westcliff, swindled his trusting clients by getting them to invest in a chateau at St Blancard, France.

He said their investment would increase and they stood to make a fortune from the sale of the chateau.

Marco had no authority to make such deals. The chateau did not sell and the clients did not make a penny.

In jailing the accountant, Judge Zoe Smith told him: "You lied, lied and lied, then followed them with more lies."

However, the judge said she had to consider his age, his poor health, the fact he has no previous convictions and his guilty plea.

Judge Smith added it was "breathtaking" the way Marco, of Southchurch Boulevard, Thorpe Bay, duped people over the past decade. Marco also failed to inform clients he was made bankrupt several years ago.

He admitted 28 charges of theft and deception, one of failing to keep proper business records and two of skipping court bail.

Published Monday, June 30, 2003

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