My mum died filled with shame after cruel cowboy builders scammed my family out of £8k – they mocked my dad, it's awful | The Sun

AN ELDERLY woman died filled with shame after cowboy builders scammed her out of £8,000, her heartbroken son has revealed.

Steven Bray, 53, watched his mum Ellen, 82, fade away while racked with guilt over the cruel con.

Rogue workmen Matty Rossiter, 18, James Rossiter, 25, and Dean Smith, 21, have been jailed for a combined eight years.

The trio filmed themselves bragging about ripping off John and Ellen Bray in Calne, Wiltshire, in 2021.

Steven's dad John, 82, paid £8,000 after the three men knocked on his door and told him he needed his roof repaired.

His son Steven, 53, told the SunOnline the men were "despicable".

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He added: "They're the lowest of the low. My mum was vulnerable, she had cancer and was more confused than usual. My Dad talked her into it, he was afraid of the roof leaking."

Steve called the group "scumbags" and said he thought the stress contributed to his mum's death.

On a social media post he wrote: "Mum was so upset and ashamed that she was conned and even more that she didn’t tell me about it until Dad insisted they spoke about it when Mum fell ill. She had never kept a secret from me.

"These f*** ripped them off. Today these scumbags were sent down for 2 to 3 1/2 years – not so smug now are they."

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He told the SunOnline his mum was "embarrassed" after their savings were plundered by the gang.

He added: "They were saving the money to pay the mortgage. My mum was usually a diligent woman, she wouldn't be taken for a fool.

"They had to pay another builder £600 to fix the damage caused to the roof.

"The men knocked on the door and claimed there was a broken ridge tile and it could be fixed for £40. Then it escalated.

"They said there were more problems and it would be best to get it sorted immediately. He took them at face value.

"They weren't wealthy, they're on a small pension and this was a significant amount of money. Dad has had to downsize and moved into a smaller flat after mum died."

While on the roof the three men filmed themselves "bodging" the job, after replacing only a handful of tiles.

The trio made £45,000 from crimes committed in 18 properties across Wiltshire, Gloucestershire and Bristol between October 2020 and March 2021.

On mobile phone footage, one of the men says: "As you can see we're doing some roofing work here. We're doing some bodging.

"As you see, what we're doing is we are in some bungalows.

''We've got two vans on the go – and as you can see, the guy we're working for, he's really old."

The individual then called out to John, who looked up from his garden below.

They said: "John, we're having quite a lot of money for this, aren't we? So we want to do you a good job. It's worth doing right, isn't it?

"It's your home, you need to live in it. So you don't want any more problems on the roof after we're gone, do you?"

The camera then turns to look at the badly repaired roof, before the cameraman added: "As you can see here, we don't need to pay thousands for advertisement.

"It's on the door-to-door knocking, what I've done for all my life, and we find guys like this every day. The door-to-door knocking. It's the way forward."

A chartered surveyor called the work "abysmal", according to Wiltshire Trading Standards.

It was "carried out with no attendant skill or competence" and "probably without the use of appropriate hand tools".

On several occasions the group knocked on the doors of elderly people and told them that their roofs needed repairing – before overcharging them by thousands.

The group used multiple business names varying by county, including Southern Homecare, Chippenham Roofing, Skyline Roofing, Wiltshire Roofing and Yate Roofing.

Matty and James Rossiter, both of Minety, in Wiltshire, admitted fraud by false representation and participating in a fraudulent business.

Matty Rossiter was jailed for two years and three months.

James Rossiter was also jailed for three years and four months, while Dean Smith, of Aldermaston, Berkshire, was sentenced to three years after pleading guilty to participating in a fraudulent business.

Judge Jason Taylor at Swindon Crown Court labelled the trio "industrial scale" rogue builders, and reprimanded them for their "arrogance" after laughing at their victim.

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He said: "Over several months you mainly targeted elderly people and you viewed them as easy targets due to their vulnerability and felt no guilt about taking advantage of them.

"Your arrogance is notable. There was significant planning. You knew the bungalows you targeted would be occupied by the elderly."

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