A man who tricked his victims out of almost a £1 million by posing as an MI5 agent has been jailed for life in London.
Robert Hendy-Freegard claimed he was protecting them from IRA gunmen and that their lives were in danger.
The 34-year-old exploited at least a dozen victims for a decade, conning them out of hundreds of thousands of pounds.
He told them he was an MI5 agent and that they were being hunted by the IRA.
In reality, he was a semi-literate former used car salesman.
London's Blackfriars Crown Court heard that his victims left themselves penniless after they handed over thousands of pounds to pay for protection, and that they believed they would be recruited to fight terrorism.
Some ended up in hiding and sleeping rough. Five of the victims were women.
Hendy-Freegard seduced them all and got engaged to nearly all of them. He was finally arrested two years ago in a police sting operation at Heathrow Airport.
Sentencing him to life imprisonment, Judge Deva Pillay told him he was an egotistical and opinionated confidence trickster who had shown not a shred of remorse or compassion for his victims.
