Moment serial romance fraudster is arrested after he conned women out of £40,000 to fund his gambling addiction as he is jailed for nearly three years

Daily Mail​

20 hours ago

This is the moment police arrested a serial romance fraudster who conned his victims out of £40,000 to fund his gambling addiction as he is jailed.
Ben Millin, 32, spun elaborate lies about dying relatives, frozen bank accounts, job interviews and serious health conditions to swindle four women out of up to £40,000, most of which he blew on online gambling.
Victims told how Millin, of Yeovil, Somerset, left them devastated after abusing their trust, and in one case, their inheritance money, to bankroll his habit.
One of his victims, Fiona, fell for his lies when he claimed family tragedies and financial disputes with an ex, asking for help with bills and travel.
In April 2022, he promised her a holiday to Spain, later switching to London, only for her to discover he had, in fact, been jailed that day for fraud against another woman.
After being released, he soon targeted another woman, Charlotte, claiming to earn £40,000 a year and later conning her out of £20,000, including inheritance from her late father, using it to fuel his £5,000 a month gambling addiction.
Their landlady, Sophie, also lost money after trusting him while they lived together.
He claimed to another victim, Chloe from Bournemouth, to be a Team GB sports psychologist and farmhouse owner, luring her with fictitious trips to London, Ibiza and Lille.
Millin admitted four counts of fraud by false representation in June 2025. Alongside his prison term of 34 months, he was handed a five-year serious crime prevention order.
Fiona and Millin first met in July 2021, and early in their relationship, he shared several heartbreaking stories about his family.
He claimed to be struggling financially due to a dispute with an ex-partner over the sale of a house, alleging she had become pregnant after being unfaithful.
Millin asked Fiona to help cover bills, travel expenses and other costs, each time promising to repay her.
He also claimed he had money issues because of a dispute with an ex-partner regarding a house they were selling, who he claimed had become pregnant after being unfaithful.
He therefore asked for her to help him pay bills, travel expenses and more, promising each time to pay her back.
In April 2022, he promised her a dream holiday to Spain but at the last minute, he claimed a heart condition meant he couldn't fly and switched the trip to London.
Fiona packed her bags and waited at home, unaware he had travelled to Bristol, not for a job interview, as he said, but to appear in court. That day, he was jailed for defrauding a former partner.
Worried when she couldn't reach him, Fiona called hospitals and police and days later, she saw his sentencing in the news, and realised she, too, had been conned.
Millin was released in December 2022 and, within six months, was targeting another woman, Charlotte via Instagram, boasting to her on Instagram that he earned £40,000 a year as a self-employed sales consultant.
Over the next seven months, he lied to Charlotte about more money issues, but also claimed to have booked a holiday to Costa Rica for them both after winning £30,000 on a scratch card.
Whenever Charlotte asked for some of her money back, Millin spun lies about serious health problems affecting him and his family to win her sympathy.
In total, she was swindled out of £20,000, cash she had largely inherited from her father after his death a few years earlier.
Police discovered that between June and October 2023, Millin blew an average of £5,500 a month on an online gambling site.
He also took out credit cards in Charlotte's name – and targeted their landlady, Sophie, who had lived with the couple for several months and believed she could trust him.
That trust was shattered just days after she left to go travelling and learned what he had done.
Sophie said her home is now a 'painful reminder' of the stress and damage caused by Millin's deceit.
He was first arrested in March 2024, but just two weeks earlier had already started targeting his next victim, Chloe from Bournemouth, whom he met on a dating site.
This time, he posed as a psychologist for Team GB and claimed he was renovating a recently purchased farmhouse near Dorchester, in Dorset.
Over the course of their three-month relationship, Millin lied about booking romantic getaways to London, Ibiza and Lille.
In June 2025, he was charged with four counts of fraud by false representation.
Last month, he pleaded guilty at Taunton Crown Court, sitting at North Somerset Courthouse, and was sentenced on July 31.
Alongside his prison term, Millin was handed restraining orders banning him from contacting his four victims, as well as a five-year serious crime prevention order.
During sentencing, the victims told the court how his crimes had left them traumatised.
Victim Fiona, from Exeter, Devon, has been diagnosed with PTSD and continues to see a therapist.
In a victim statement, she said: 'I find it difficult to fully express the profound and lasting impact that Ben's actions have had on my life and mental health. Not only did he defraud me of every penny I had, but the way he did so has caused immeasurable damage to my well-being.'
She said he was a 'predator' who targeted vulnerable women, who lied and exploited their sympathy for gain, adding: ' He is, in my opinion, a complete danger to society, especially women.'
Charlotte, from Crewkerne, Somerset, said it was not until she heard Ben had been charged and remanded that she felt truly safe. She told him personal issues about past relationships and family illnesses, which he 'weaponised' against her.
'I was a chess piece in a game that I didn't know I was playing,' she said.
Referring to the money from her father's inheritance that Millin stole, she said: ' It was money that I was always too scared to spend, due to the meaning it had to me. To me, spending it meant losing more of my father, which is something I could never face, hence why, after over six years, I had it in my bank untouched.
'I had explained to Ben how I'd wanted to buy my father a grave stone - something I still couldn't face as it felt very final - to go travelling, to buy a van and have the adventures I had always wanted and planned before my father became ill, to have the security of having a home of my own somewhere I'd feel safe and at peace finally.
'For Ben to know all of this and to still want more and more, to push and push me until I was so weak I couldn't fight back, is everything you need to know about him; the mental abuse he so easily inflicted on me is completely life-changing for me.'
Charlotte added: 'I feel I could never have a relationship again, which is completely out of character from the person that I was.'
Lastly, Chloe said on one occasion, he falsely claimed his sister-in-law had stabbed his brother and asked Chloe to prepare to care for his supposed children, even buying food and supplies for them.
'This entire situation was later revealed to be completely fabricated,' she said, adding: 'Ben's conduct was not only dishonest but highly manipulative and emotionally exploitative.'
Speaking after the sentencing, DC Claire Morgan, said: 'Ben Millin preyed on the goodwill of his victims by spinning a web of lies. He tricked them into being sympathetic towards him.
'All the time he was using the money to fund his gambling habits, with seemingly little guilt, given how he repeated the fraud against multiple victims.'
She added: 'All the women in this case have shown incredible courage, and we are grateful for their support in these court proceedings. They are all victims and they should feel no shame about what happened to them; there is only one person who should be embarrassed.
'I've been investigating crimes for 18 years, and Ben Millin is by far the most complex character I have met in regards to the deceit and lies he managed to maintain. He was a master of manipulation.
'By coming forward those women helped to protect others being targeted by him and potentially other crimes from happening.
'Sadly, I have no doubt there will be other victims of romance fraud out there who will read their powerful testimonies and they will be going through the exact same pain and trauma. Hopefully convictions like this give confidence to those people to report what has happened so we can help them.'