Latest news with #kitchenfitter
Daily Mail
29-06-2025
- Daily Mail
Cowboy builder charged families £100k for their dream kitchens and then never installed them
A rogue kitchen fitter who took £100,000 from families, ripped out their kitchens and fled with their money has been jailed. Jamie Brown, 56, left 19 families in utter despair when he turned their homes upside down, ignored their messages and then finally admitted he would not be returning to finish the job or hand back their cash. In one particularly cruel betrayal, he ripped out the kitchen of a couple who were weeks away from having a baby, but never returned to fit a new one, leaving them with a home in tatters as they juggled the first few months of their newborn's life. The dodgy builder, who lives in a detached newbuild house in Bristol, ran his company Brown and Son Interiors, which flaunts a string of fully completed kitchen installations on its Instagram page. Meanwhile, his LinkedIn profile boasts 'over 25 years of experience' carrying out 'quality, fully guaranteed kitchen installations in and around the South West and Wales'. However, the reality could not be more different as families were conned out of their life savings and left with a hollow shell where their kitchen once stood. In what seemed like a cruel joke, the father continued to go on holidays, with his wife Nina posting pictures of their travels on Facebook for his victims to see. Was your home ruined by this man? Email: Brown appeared at Bristol Crown Court to be sentenced on 19 counts of theft in a prosecution brought by South Gloucestershire Council's Trading Standards department. Nine of his victims also attended court to see his sentencing, and hear the circumstances around how he stole from them over the spring and summer of 2023. Prosecuting, Lee Reynolds told the court how Brown was very keen to be hired to undertake work, most of which was to fit new kitchens. He said a pattern emerged, which saw him warn prospective customers they needed to agree to the job and pay up front quickly or prices would go up. However, once money had changed hands, he would be evasive and elusive. Brown would arrive to start the job, ripping out kitchens and often leaving them there, but disappear again and give a variety of excuses about why he was not returning to begin work to fit a new one, the court heard. Many of his victims eventually discovered they had ordered and paid for new kitchens through him, but he had not even purchased the kitchens from the retail suppliers, such as Howdens and Magnet. This continued until September 2023, when customers received texts, the first informing them that Brown had 'had a mental breakdown', and a second informing them that his company had gone into liquidation and they would not be receiving any money back or any new kitchens. Mr Reynolds said: 'One victim says that she was totally devastated by what had happened. This wiped out her savings. Another said it had taken him three years to save the money for a new kitchen and had been left without a kitchen at all. 'He had to take out a loan of £7,000 for another kitchen, which will take him six years to repay. 'Another victim had been told by Mr Brown that he had until 5pm that day to lock in the price for a new kitchen, and paid the money the next day, and the existing kitchen was removed in the August. 'This was a cause of high emotional stress and anxiety at a time when his wife was nine months pregnant, and they were left without basic facilities for their newborn baby, as well as losing £12,500,' Mr Reynolds added. One victim said the scale of Brown's serial offending only came to light when staff at kitchen suppliers Howdens told her she was not the only one - when they broke the news to her that the father never paid for the kitchen she'd ordered. South Gloucestershire Council's Trading Standards were notified after the September liquidation of his company, Brown and Son Interiors. They began an investigation, finding he had done the same thing before, with a previous company called JR Brown Interior Installations Ltd. In fact, the investigation discovered that on the same day he was telling customers of the first company that he couldn't do the work and they'd lost their money, he was cunningly setting up the second company to continue his conmanship. 'We were moving into a new house in Keynsham and it needed a whole new kitchen,' said one victim, who was in court to see Brown jailed. 'We paid £14,000 up front of £27,000 in total so he could order the kitchen, and he sent a plasterer and then an electrician to prepare the kitchen, but then told us we'd have to pay them too, and he'd take it off the final bill. 'He ripped out our kitchen and then left us. We didn't have running water, no way of cooking, no washing machine. We rigged up a temporary thing in the garage, but he left it and that went on for ten weeks, with different excuses. 'In the end I rang Howdens and they said they could deliver the kitchen, but it would have to be paid for. That's when I realised for sure what was going on, it was devastating,' she added. In the almost two years since, the victim said the Trading Standards department at South Gloucestershire Council had been 'incredible' in supporting the victims and putting the case together. 'What made it worse was that he continued to go on all these lovely holidays. His wife would post pictures of them going on holidays, one after another, all the time. I stopped looking because she blocked me on Facebook, but friends would send me screenshots. I was left thinking ''these are holidays we should be going on, not him''. 'I gathered all the evidence of that in the period since, and submitted it to the Trading Standards prosecutors and it added to the exacerbating factors of the offending,' she added. Brown was eventually charged with 19 counts of theft, alongside his wife Nina, who was listed as a company director at the time. The case against Nina was formally discontinued in court last week. Brown initially pleaded 'not guilty' to the charges at a series of court hearings last winter and a trial date was set for April 2026. But in April he changed his plea to 'guilty', admitting 19 counts of theft. There was some dispute in court about the total amount of money he had stolen. The prosecution opened their case and put the amount at £101,602.91, but Brown's defence counsel David Sapiecha said the true figure was £84,817. In mitigation, Mr Sapiecha told Bristol Crown Court that Brown had been a man of previous good character who hadn't set up the companies with the intention of stealing from people, but 'things had become too much for him'. 'He is not ingrained dishonest, he's someone who acted dishonestly for a period,' Mr Sapiecha said. 'He believed one day things could be put right.' He told the court that the couple are now in the process of selling their home and the proceeds would be used to pay back every penny to people who lost money. Judge James Patrick said the benchmark sentence for such an offence was three years, but with his age, good character and other mitigation, he would bring this down to 18 months. He told Brown he was close to accepting Mr Sapiecha's submission that he could be dealt with through a suspended sentence, but decided the level of offending, the number of victims and the devastation they had gone through were such that only a prison sentence would do. 'You lied and lied consistently,' said Judge Patrick. 'This is not even a case where you were robbing Peter to pay Paul. You were going in, ripping up kitchens and spinning the lie that there was going to be jam tomorrow, but there never was. 'That left a huge inconvenience to people. It is to your credit that you've put your house up for sale, but these people are still to be compensated and it's June 2025 now, and they've also suffered huge emotional distress. 'I bear in mind the effect this will have on your life, but I've concluded it's not possible to avoid a custodial sentence,' he said, telling Brown he will serve at least 40 per cent of the 18 months in prison before he can be released on licence.
Times
27-06-2025
- Business
- Times
Kitchen fitter branded ‘worst ever seen' sues for defamation
A kitchen fitter is claiming nearly £20,000 in damages after a homeowner posted a scathing online review that described his work as the 'worst I have ever seen'. In a move that could have a lasting impact on the building trade, Benjamin Johnson has gone before a High Court judge to bring a defamation claim against his former client. After a judge granted permission for the claim to proceed, Johnson said he was suing because he was 'sick and tired' of customers who 'can do what they want and think they can get away with it'. The dispute centres on comments by Stephen Helm, the disgruntled homeowner, who publicly stated that Johnson was an 'absolute joke' and warned others to 'avoid' using him. On a website for reviews of tradesmen, Helm claimed that Johnson 'damaged everything', adding that he was 'the worst fitter I have ever seen'. Johnson, who is based in Preston, told the court that the review remained online for more than 17 months and that as a result customers cancelled jobs, which left him £19,000 out of pocket. The dispute broke out after Helm hired the fitter in 2022 to carry out work on his kitchen. The preliminary hearing in the High Court was told that the two then rowed about the standard of Johnson's work and he stopped the job. As a result, Helm and Johnson agreed a financial settlement but the next month the homeowner posted a review of Johnson's Joinery onto a website for comments on local businesses. • No mate of mine: the perils of reviewing a handyman Helm's review said: 'The worse [sic] fitter I have ever seen, ruined everything he touched, didn't do a full day. Damaged everything and can't draw a straight line. Cut into the units which didn't need touching. Plasterboarded the walls and we lost 10cm for no reason.' In addition, Helm described the fitter as 'lazy' and claimed that there were 'dangerous health concerns regarding his work as he pushed pipes into the waste pipe for washing machine and dishwasher and sealed with silicone which backed up waste from toilet into the machines'. He advised readers of the review site to 'avoid avoid avoid', saying that Johnson was an 'absolute joke, embarrassing and when questioned for consumer rights claim said his feelings were hurt as we were questioning his character. Should not be in business so avoid'. Johnson launched court proceedings in 2023 and in response to the claim, Helm has argued that he was sharing the 'truth and honest opinion'. If Helm can prove that his criticism of the fitter was true and that he honestly believes his comments were accurate, Johnson's defamation claim will fail. Helm has also launched a counterclaim seeking damages for breach of contract in respect to the works carried out. Judge Spearman ruled that the wording of the review 'plainly contains some statements of opinion and some statements of fact' as he allowed the claim to proceed to a full trial.
