An Ealing woman has been jailed for selling an elderly widow's family home in Greenford as part of a £200,000 fraud.

Ravina Rattan, 68, of Noel Road, Ealing , was sentenced to six years behind bars on Friday (January 13) at St Albans Crown Court after she had been found guilty on December 15 of two counts of fraud by abuse of position and one count of money laundering.

The fraudster's plot was uncovered after the 72-year-old victim was locked out of her home and reported the matter to police.

Metropolitan Police said the fraud was carried out between January 2007 and May 2013 after Rattan was placed in charge of the victim's financial affairs.

The victim, who cannot speak English, asked for Rattan's help after her husband had died in 2006.

She lived in a mortgage-free, four bedroom house in Verulam Road, Greenford, with her daughter and young granddaughter.

It was agreed that Rattan would look after all her financial affairs and took possession of all identity documents and banking information, including chequebooks and bank cards.

In April 2007, a mortgage application was accepted for a loan secured against the victim's property.

A mortgage advance of £198,891.15 was paid into a Barclays Bank Account that was set up in the victim's name but controlled by Rattan.

But in an investigation by the Met Police's Falcon Unit, it was found that Rattan had used copies of the victim's signature to complete the mortgage application.

There was no direct debit set up to pay the mortgage and, although intermittent cheque payments were made, the account fell into arrears.

By 2012, repossession proceedings were started due to the lack of repayments on the mortgage.

Later in the year, the victim returned home to find her house had been boarded up, which Rattan explained was a gas leak and said the family could not go home.

She would not even allow the family to return home to collect their belongings, and further gave a number of excuses as to why the family could not return, the Met Police said.

During this period, through falsification of documents, Rattan sold the property and the proceeds were deposited in a bank account opened in the name of the victim, but controlled by Rattan.

Proceeds of the sale were then distributed into various bank accounts, one of which belonged directly to the defendant.

After the victim contacted Action Fraud in October 2014, the case was referred to the Met's Falcon Unit and Rattan was arrested in December 2014.

Officers searched Rattan's office premises and found a large amount of paperwork relating to the victim, including her bank cards and passports.

They also found a number of blank cheques containing the victim's signature and correspondence regarding the sale of the house in Middlesex.

Rattan was charged in June 2015 with fraud and abuse of position and also later charged with money laundering.

She was sentenced to six years imprisonment for both counts of fraud and 18 months for the money laundering, to be served concurrently.

Detective constable Simon Allen, of the Met Police's Specialist, Organised and Economic Crime Command Unit, said: "This was a sustained and malicious abuse of trust of a vulnerable woman that resulted in the loss of a family home.

"Rattan has shown no remorse for her crimes and has continued to deny any knowledge of the fraud despite the overwhelming evidence against her gathered by investigating officers.

"The sentence handed down by the court today reflects the severity of Rattan's crimes and the devastating result of her fraudulent behaviour."

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