A FRAUDSTER who conned elderly people but repeatedly persuaded judges to let him keep his liberty is today behind bars.

Michael John Wild, 50, gave a list of excuses to two judges as to why he hadn’t done his punishment for his crimes.

In September, when he had completed only 12.5 hours of the 250 hours community service imposed by York’s top judge – Judge Stephen Ashurst – he told Recorder Christopher Knox he would do the rest of the work and claimed that he had been too ill to do it earlier.

The judge declared a sick note presented to him appeared to be forged and gave him a stern warning.

He ordered that any failure to do the work would mean Wild would have to explain himself to Judge Ashurst and gave him six months to do it.

Prosecuting for the probation service, Stephen Thornton told York Crown Court that Wild failed to turn up for the first two work sessions after his court appearance and probation officers sent him back to court.

“All I want to do is finish it,” Wild told Judge Ashurst from the dock.

He also wrote the judge a letter and through his barrister Alex Menary claimed the probation service had not told him when to turn up for work.

The judge told him: “You have come to the end of the road. You have not kept your side of the bargain.”

He ordered Wild to serve the six-month sentence he imposed and suspended for consumer law offences in November 2013.

He heard that after Wild had been told he would be sent back in front of him, Wild had done two days’ work, bringing the total number of hours completed up to 27.

Wild, of Oxford House, Lowther Terrace, pleaded guilty to the breach and to stealing cigarettes by conning a shop assistant while under the suspended sentence.

The consumer law offences, which had involved deceiving elderly people over a potential change in the law, were committed while Wild was on another suspended sentence for credit card fraud.