eBay teen scammer steals £45,000 selling nothing

A 17-year-old boy from Wales, who made over £45,000 from selling non-existent goods on eBay, spent the proceeds on living the high life and taunted his victims about it over email, police told courts yesterday.

The teenager, who can't be named due to his age, managed to swindle 100 people out of thousands of pounds, police told Cwmbran youth court during his trial, and blew the victims' money on a wannabe-millionaire lifestyle.

The teen bought expensive electrical goods, including a hi-fi, flat-screen TVs and PCs, purchased a quad bike, paid for limousine rides for him and his friends and lived the high life on holiday in New York, even treating mates to a helicopter ride over the city.

Initially, the youth pretended to sell mobile phones over the auction site, then moved onto advertising non-existent camcorders and other expensive items.

Paul Moore of the prosecution told the court the boy could was "addicted" to the auction site because it gave him "a buzz".

He went on to send emails to those he had conned, telling them how we was spending their cash. One victim lost £2,500 to the scammer, who had set up three bank accounts in order to handle the proceeds of the fraud.

The eBay teen admitted 21 counts of fraud worth over £16,000 and asked the court to take 64 more offences amounting to £28,860 into consideration.

The boy will be sentenced at Newport Crown Court.