Nichola Dame Hartwell, 50, is the Director of ‘Mr and Miss Black and Beautiful’, a “community focused non-profit social enterprise” aimed at assisting the career prospects of the young and underprivileged.
She was happy to assist her lodger Paul Atherton when he inherited the money from his late mother, but had no bank account of his own for it to be paid into.
He planned to give the entire sum to his son when he turned eighteen years-old.
Hartwell, of Kennings Way, Lambeth - a Social & Policy graduate from South Bank university - vowed to look after the money in her own account, but instead spent the lot.
She spent years fighting the case, but after an Inner London Crown Court trial was convicted of two counts of theft between July 19, 2015 and March 11, 2019.
“This is in breach of trust,” Recorder Leo Seelig told a tearful Hartwell, who was sent to prison in the nineties for similar offences. “He trusted you to safeguard his inheritance and you stole it.
“It must have been painful for him that you used that money as your own.”
Hartwell was sentenced to two years imprisonment, suspended for eighteen months and must complete 120 hours community service work, plus fifteen days of a rehabilitation activity requirement.
She was described as having a “long term” friendship with Mr Atherton, who suffers with chronic fatigue and had stayed at her address on different occasions.
He did not have or want a bank account and arranged for the inheritance to be transferred to Hartwell’s “dormant account” without any written contract or agreement.
Over the next four years Hartwell says she used the money for day-to-day expenses, but always intended to repay Mr Atherton, until the balance was reduced to just £6.00.
She told the court: “It was not malicious or calculated. It was for living costs, for food and items for my accuser, I remain innocent in this instance.
“I felt I had borrowed the monies and I was always going to pay it back.”
Hartwell continues to maintain her innocence and is appealing the conviction at the High Court, insisting Mr Atherton was impossible to find to repay the money.
She told the court a prison sentence would destroy her plans for motherhood and interrupt her private fertility medical treatment as well as the care she provides to her 94 year-old grandmother.
“The money stolen was of substantial value to Mr Atherton and there was financial harm as a result of the loss of that money and emotional distress to him and, no doubt, his son,” said Recorder Seelig.
“You continue to deny these offences, but I must do justice to the jury’s decision,” he told Hartwell. “You agreed to hold this money in one of your bank accounts on his behalf.
“At some point you decided you could treat the money as your own. If you did borrow it with the intention to repay you have not done so.”
None of the money has been repaid by Hartwell, who will now be subject to a Proceeds of Crime Act investigation in an attempt to identify any of her assets.
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