Mark Whittingham: conman stole almost $750,000 to fund extravagant lifestyle

A Melbourne conman spent years fleecing his victims to pay for an “increasingly extravagant lifestyle” of expensive homes, luxury cars and private education for his kids. But then it all came crashing down. Here’s how.

Whittingham had a taste for luxury cars similar to this Land Rover.

A “brazen” Bayside conman who fleeced almost $750,000 from unsuspecting victims to fund an extravagant lifestyle has been jailed.

Mark Whittingham, 49, was sentenced in the County Court to a minimum of three years and four months after he pleaded guilty to 16 charges of obtaining financial advantage by deception.

Whittingham ran a racket where he took large cash deposits for false “rent roles” — a list of rental properties managed by a real estate agency — from unsuspecting real estate agents between January and June, 2013.

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An Edithvale real estate agent, who gave Whittingham a deposit of almost $25,000 for a role containing properties in Parkdale, Mentone, Mordialloc, Aspendale and Chelsea, was forced to sell his home to keep his business afloat, with the saga almost ending his marriage.

Whittingham also fleeced a Moonee Ponds-based real estate agent and two real estate agents based in Queensland.

The court heard Whittingham had conducted a series of rorts and scams over several years.

In 2012 he rorted a Queensland businessman out of almost $14,000. He was charged by Victoria Police for those offences in February, 2015 before being granted bail five months later.

But the prolific fraudster hadn’t learned his lesson.

Whittingham created false identity ‘Mark Logie’ to illegally obtain funds to buy luxury vehicles from dealers in Gardenvale, Berwick and Mornington.

He also concocted an “elaborate scam” to steal cash from the Westpac Bank via loans and credit cards.

His run came to an end when he was arrested in March, 2016.

All up, the former banker and real estate agent, who had lived in Beaumaris and Hampton, stole $744,877.

Whittingham had no priors but the court heard that he committed subsequent offences between July 2012, and January, 2016 which were dealt with in the Moorabbin Magistrates’ Court.

These offences included ripping off several people on online classified site Gumtree.

Whittingham also falsely obtained two BMWs from a Brighton dealership.

County Court Judge Douglas Trapnell said Whittingham committed his “brazen” crime to support an “increasingly extravagant lifestyle”.

“You committed these offences in order to support a lifestyle that involved you living in expensive houses in fashionable suburbs, you and your wife driving luxury cars and your daughters attending a private girls’ school,” he said.

“Your business was unable to support this extravagance, so you decided to defraud other hard working members of the community.

“It is clear that since July, 2012 you have been a consistent and persistent fraudster, conducting numerous schemes to obtain money, goods or services from your innocent victims, to which you were not entitled.

“You have been and, in my opinion, remain a financial hazard to this community.”

Whittingham was sentenced to a maximum five years in jail with a non-parole period of 3 years and 4 months.

He had spent 1053 days in custody at the time of sentencing, so will be eligible for parole in just over 40 days.

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