Jail for equine charity cheat who used donations to fund 'lavish lifestyle'

62-year-old used bank account as 'personal piggybank' 

A woman who conned the public into donating money to an equine company she claimed was a charity has been jailed.

Wendy Elizabeth Megson, who has been in custody since her trial, had never registered Manx Equitherapy Limited (MEL) as a charity but sought donations from individuals and companies.

The 62-year-old fraudulently used other charities’ registration numbers to obtain funding and failed to file annual accounts between 2013 and 2019.

She was found guilty after a trial of two charity act offences and two of deception; jurors also convicted her of nine counts of benefit fraud.  

Between 2017 and 2021 Megson was overpaid more than £31,000 in benefits after claiming she couldn’t work; the claim was fraudulent from the outset.

During sentencing at Douglas Courthouse – which Megson refused to attend – the court heard she’d solicited money for MEL including £1,000 from a charitable initiative run by Tesco.

The bank account where donations were held was used as her ‘personal piggy bank’ the prosecutor said to fund a ‘lavish lifestyle’ which included shopping sprees, off-Island trips and hotel stays.

Sentencing Megson as if she was in the courtroom Deemster Graeme Cook was told the hearing marked the 24^th in this case.

Describing her actions as ‘planned exploitation of the public’ he sent her to prison for 39 months telling her: “It is time for sentence to be imposed upon you.”

Megson was previously jailed in August last year, for 20 weeks, after being found guilty of animal cruelty offences after a trial which also took place in her absence.

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