A former antiques dealer has gone on trial accused of 46 charges, including scamming two customers out of more than £20,000 and stealing valuable items from 44 different people over more than a decade.
Kenneth Robb, 73, of Blalowan Gardens, Cupar, denies duping the customers out of paintings, jewellery, cameras, sporting equipment, antiques and clothing.
Over an 11-year period he is alleged to have told customers he would pass on the proceeds of sales to them, minus his fee – but instead, prosecutors say, he stole “the property or the proceeds of the sale of that property”.
Robb is on trial before Sheriff George Way at Dundee Sheriff Court, accused of stealing valuable objects from dozens of customers and inflating the value of paintings he sold to two of them, defrauding them out of more than £20,000.
Robb formerly ran Kingdom Antiques in Cupar, where prosecutors allege that between January 1 2005 and July 31 2016, he took property from a total of 44 different people on the basis he would sell them in his shop for a fee.
Fife Council trading standards officer Kathryn Hart told the court she started investigating about 36 complaints from customers in 2011 or 2012.
She said initially it was the business, Kingdom Antiques, that she was investigating but the name Ken Robb came up more and more after the business closed down.
Under examination by fiscal depute Lynne Mannion, Ms Hart said she had met Robb on one occasion at an “informal” meeting at Fife Police HQ.
Despite attempting to contact him on numerous occasions following that meeting and sending several registered and hand-delivered letters to his home asking him to come in for interview, he failed to respond. On one occasion, Robb left a voicemail for her saying he could not attend for an interview. However, despite offering him another appointment, he failed to respond again.
Ms Hart said on January 9 and 10 2013, along with police officers, she had gone to a warehouse at Front Lebanon in Cupar where customers’ items were being stored following the closure of the firm’s shop and seized a number of them.
The trial continues.
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