Falmouth bus driver 'forged wills in £310,000 alleged fraud'

Percival John Harris, aged 59, of Turnaware Road, Falmouth appeared at Truro Crown Court on Monday to face charges of theft, two charges of conspiracy to make a false instrument by forging two wills, perverting the course of justice and fraud.

One of the homeless men, Michael Davies-Patrick, aged 38, is also in court, facing two charges of making a false instrument and one of perverting the course of justice.

Another homeless man, Eric Cullen, was additionally charged in connection with the case but has since died.

Both Harris and Davies-Patrick plead not guilty to the charges.

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Harris is charged with forging the will of Kathleen Moyle from Falmouth to give him 95% of her assets rather than the 25% he was supposed to get in an official will, written in 2015 through solicitors Hine Downing.

He is further charged with forging the will of Mr Moyle after his death.

It is alleged that Harris paid Davies-Patrick and Cullen £20 each to sign forged handwritten wills. The court was told he’d met the two homeless men whilst a bus driver on the Falmouth and Truro route ferrying them to sell the Big Issue in the town and city. They were homeless and addicted to crack cocaine and heroin.

Harris recruited them as “witnesses” to the signing of a will by Mr Moyle and another by Mrs Moyle, giving Harris 95% of her estate - with 5% being left to a relative.

In fact, the prosecution says, Harris had written the wills himself on legal pro-forma you can buy online and Davies-Patrick and Cullen had never even met the Moyles, or knew who they were.

The court was told that forging the wills had netted Harris £85,500. However, prior to that, having befriended the couple, Harris had been given Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA) over Mr and Mrs Moyle’s estate in 2014, it is claimed he paid himself £220,000 from their bank accounts.

“He was taking advantage of his position of trust he was in, having been granted a lasting power of attorney while she [Mrs Moyle] was in a care home suffering with dementia,” said the prosecution barrister “and in due course hoovered up what was left for the benefit of him and his family, either while she was still alive from her bank accounts or by manipulation of the will.”

The court heard that Mr Moyle had died in September 2016 at Falmouth District Hospital while his wife Kathleen died on February 14, 2018, at Camborne Redruth Community Hospital aged 77. The court was told she had been suffering with dementia for a long time  before she died.

The court heard that the LPA gave Harris access to the Moyles’ accounts but clauses in the agreement specifically denied him permission to spend money on himself, and stipulated that he must make decisions in the best interests of the family.

However, it is claimed that in 2014, even before he was given the LPA, he had already taken £4,000 from their accounts.

“Mr Harris used it [the LPA] not in the Moyles’ best interests but for his own use and did it dishonestly by abusing his position of trust,” said the prosecutor.

By the time Mrs Moyle died, the prosecution said that Harris had withdrawn more than £200,000 from her accounts and spent it on cars, his family and paying 40% of the cost of a £250,000 house, which left him mortgage free.

It is alleged that after her death Harris forged a will to replace the former official will written in 2015, which would have seen Harris given 25% of the residue of Mrs Moyle’s estate in the event of her husband having already died by the time of her death.

In that will, legally written and properly witnessed by her solicitor, she left 75% of what was left of her estate to members of her family.

The prosecution said that, additionally, the 2015 will had left all Mrs Moyle’s jewellery to her niece or great nieces; however this was also changed by Harris and the jewellery given to his own wife and the couple’s daughter.

In total Harris is said to have gained £310,000 from the Moyles.

The prosecutor said the Moyles thought of Harris as a valued friend and that if Harris had taken no money from Mrs Moyle at all while she was alive, and her 2015 will had been left as it should, it was likely that he would still have eventually received £78,000.

The prosecution say the pro-forma wills were printed by a firm called Lawpack. One of the company’s editors, James Ross, told the court the code printed on the bottom right corner of Mr Moyle’s alleged fake will showed that it was part of a batch printed after Mr Moyle had died.

He said the will form allegedly signed by ‘Mrs Moyle’ was not printed until after the date the witnesses were supposed to have signed it. It was therefore impossible for either Mrs Moyle or Mr Moyle to have signed the handwritten wills themselves.

He told the court that at the time you could buy the forms at WH Smith, Rymans and even Amazon.

The prosecution claim Mr Harris got Davies-Patrick and Cullen to sign the documents in his car parked in a multi-storey car park in Truro.

In a police interview, Davies-Patrick said that he never read the documents and didn’t even realise that they were wills.

The trial came after relatives of the Moyles challenged the handwritten wills.

The trial continues.