Fraudsters went on £60,000 spending spree using stolen credit cards to buy designer clothes, shoes, handbags and even a WEDDING

A pair of fraudsters went on a £60,000 spending spree using stolen credit cards to buy designer clothes, shoes and even a wedding.

Abraham George and Olatunde Emmanuel Lawal from Manchester were sentenced today after police found they had used the stolen money to fund a lavish lifestyle far beyond their means.

Manchester Crown Court heard that when George's home was raided, officers found an unusually high number of designer items with expensive electrical items in every room.

He was also caught with more than £560 worth of alcohol fraudulently bought from Waitrose using stolen cards and his house was strewn with receipts from the fraudulent transactions.

As part of the investigation, officers found George and his wife enjoyed an extravagant lifestyle far beyond their legitimate means of income recorded with the Inland Revenue. 

The couple's wedding at the Davenport Green Hotel in Hale Barns, of which the venue alone cost £14,000, was also suspected of being paid for using stolen money. 

It was heard in court that George and Lawal met and agreed the fraudulent stolen card scheme at church, and Lawal was paid £50 for each of the transactions by George.

The pair used a stolen Hilton Honours credit card issued by Barclaycard to a genuine cardholder to make more than 40 transactions between May 11, 2012 and May 31, 2012.

The hotel card was used to load pre-paid cards at Paypoint terminals - these can be loaded with a specific amount of money and used as debit cards that are not linked directly to any account.

In total they used the card to spend £32,950 - mainly at Co-op supermarkets in the West Yorkshire and Greater Manchester areas.

George and Lawal also used a stolen Natwest card to rack up transactions of more than £25,000.

The genuine cardholder reported that in September 2012 someone accessed her online banking, changed her passwords and made several unauthorised withdrawals and transactions on her account.  

The pair pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud and money laundering at an earlier hearing.

George, 37, of Heaton Park Road, was today sentenced to 24 months imprisonment and Lawal was given a 12 month prison sentence, suspended for two years and 200 hours unpaid work. 

Police Constable Andrew Butcher said: 'These men must have thought they had struck gold. 

'They managed to get hold of genuine credit card holder's details and went on a spending spree. George, in particular, used the money to kit his house out with designer clothes and expensive electrical items, none of which he could have come close to affording on his wages.