Former bank boss and councillor jailed for three years for defrauding friend out of £100,000

A former Methodist Minister, bank boss, and councillor who fraudulently took tens of thousands of pounds from a woman after abusing his power as a will executor has been jailed for three years.

Paul Flowers (05/06/1950), of Brattice Drive, Swinton, plead guilty to 18 counts of fraud by abuse of position in July last year, and was formally handed his sentence at Manchester Crown Court today (27 February 2025).

The court heard how the woman wrote her will with the intention of her money being donated to various charities upon her death.

Flowers had known his victim for a number of decades and had become friends with her, with him being appointed as sole executor of the will in the 2000s.

However, Flowers callously used her money on expensive holidays, events, significant home improvements, and booze, with the majority of the offences coming in 2016 and 2017. He also wrote cheques to himself amounting to over £40,000.

Instead of safeguarding her money, as he had agreed, he used it to fund his own extravagant lifestyle, taking advantage of the fact that she was too unwell to recognise what was happening.

In total, around £100,000 was fraudulently taken from her accounts. This includes the withdrawal of around £70,000 in cash, with the rest being used to buy various goods and services. He continued to spend the money until it had nearly all been spent.

The crime was flagged to GMP by bank officials in 2019 and subsequently investigated by our specialist Economic Crime Unit.

Prior to this, it had been flagged to the bank by the victim’s pension provider, after discovering that she had died. They had been paying the victim’s pension for approximately two years after her death.

Detective Constable Kate Riley, a fraud investigations officer at GMP, said: “Flowers completely abused his position as a will executor and as a friend, fraudulently taking tens of thousands of pounds that he simply was not entitled to.

“The money should have been going to good causes, but instead went to satisfying Flowers indulgent lifestyle of holidays, cruises, and expensive food and wine. He and his victim had worked together on charitable projects, so he was fully aware of the importance of charitable gifts in her will.

“This self-serving behaviour has now rightly been punished, and Flowers has time behind bars to think about his deceitful actions.”