A mother who took on the identity of a dead woman has been jailed along with her daughter for a Kensington property fraud.

Diane Jean Moorcroft, 62, and Laylah Scarlett De Cruz, 31, were handed three and five year sentences respectively on Friday (March 18), having been found guilty of conspiracy to commit fraud at Southwark Crown Court earlier in the year.

The pair pocketed £1.2 million in the scam, which police say has not been recovered.

The court had heard De Cruz, who lived in Dubai, and her mother, from Warley Road, Blackpool, had conspired with others to rent a property in Kensington using fraudulent documents .

When the tenancy of property had been secured, Moorcroft changed her name by Deed Poll to that of the genuine owner of the property, who was deceased, and travelled to Dubai where she opened bank accounts in the dead woman’s name.

She then travelled back to London where she successfully applied for a loan of £1.2m against the property.

When the loan was approved in October 2014, the proceeds of the fraud were transferred to the bank accounts in Dubai that Moorcroft had opened with her new UK passport under her new name and the funds were subsequently withdrawn in cash.

An investigation was launched in October 2014 by fraud detectives from the Met’s Operation Falcon after HM Land Registry reported suspicious activity around this particular Kensington property to police, and Moorcroft was arrested in February 2015 at her home in Blackpool on suspicion of fraud.

De Cruz was also arrested on suspicion of fraud as she entered the UK from Dubai in May 2016.

Both were subsequently charged with conspiracy to commit fraud, and were found guilty following a 10-day trial.

A 'devious fraud'

Detective Constable Richard Kirk of Operation Falcon said: “As these women conducted this devious fraud, it is clear that it didn’t occur to them that official agencies would be able to see through their scheme and this was their undoing.

“Although the wider investigation to trace additional members of the network is ongoing, it is clear that De Cruz and Moorcroft played key roles in the execution of this crime.

“It is my hope that their incarceration today has seriously disrupted the activities of any additional members of the group.”

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