The family of financial adviser Peter Barlow owned four houses and four performance cars during the period he allegedly stole £400,000 from a rich client, a jury has heard.

Barlow also took foreign holidays, paid school fees for his two younger sons at St Peter's School, York, credit card bills of up to £1,350 a month, "substantial" mobile phone bills and £120-a-week gardening bills.

By late 1993 and early 1994, Barlow was paying hundreds of pounds a month on Spot The Ball competitions as an "investment", Leeds Crown Court heard.

The prosecution claims the family's main legitimate income was between £1,000 and £4,000 a year from his financial services business and his sons' holiday jobs.

He claims he and former Hazelwood Foods plc director Edward Hickson had an agreement he could use the businessman's money and would repay it from the profits of a housing scheme in Copmanthorpe.

Barlow, aged 57, of Tadcaster Road, Copmanthorpe, denies 11 charges of theft which together allege he stole £96,000 from a trust set up by deceased North Yorkshire farmer Alec Ingham and £400,000 from Mr Hickson between 1990 and 1994.

On his third full day in the witness box, Barlow agreed with prosecution counsel Andrew Dallas he had not paid council tax or business rates on one house because it was the name of his student son Charles. He also had difficulty at times making mortgage payments and household bills.

The jury has heard that apart from the Barlow marital home, the family owned two houses in Copmanthorpe as part of the building scheme. Barlow said that in 1986 he bought one of the first Ford Escort Cosworths which he traded it in for a later model.

That was seized after he was made bankrupt. For two years in the 1990s he kept a Cosworth in the garage as an "investment".

By 1990 he had also bought a Ford Fiesta XR2i which his eldest son now used and maintained.

In 1992 he bought a BMW 325i Sport for £16,300 and in November 1992, he bought a £19,500 Toyota Land Cruiser for his new laser shooting business. Both were bought with a cash deposit and finance deal and now belonged to his wife Sylvia.

Barlow said the couple paid air fares for a Bahamas holiday and he investigated the possibility of buying timeshares there but had not bought any. They also went on European holidays.

He claimed the family made a profit on Spot The Ball competitions, and that these were a form of investment.

He denied Mr Dallas' suggestion that he was trying to gamble his way out of his financial problems.

The trial continues.

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