JUSTICE last night finally caught up on a conman who swindled £115,000 from a councillor’s antiques firm 11 years ago.

Oliver Trusgnach was yesterday jailed for 27 months – watched at Oxford Crown Court by David Harvey, the victim he fleeced for thousands but who played a crucial part in his eventual capture.

Trusgnach – reportedly a one-time former male prostitute involved in a political scandal in Belgium – had been missing since he said he was off to collect some drycleaning, when his cheque scam was about to be exposed.

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The 40-year-old, now of Carrer de Sant Miguel, Palma, Mallorca, had been employed by WR Harvey & Co in Witney as a gallery manager between 2000 and 2003.

Prosecutor Alexandra Bull said he almost immediately started writing himself cheques and forging the signature of managing director Mr Harvey.

Seventy-seven forged cheques were paid into Trusgnach’s four bank accounts and he covered his tracks by falsifying the cheque stubs and account details.

Miss Bull said his lies came to light on July 7, 2003, when he was asked to prepare a full record of all the cheques he had sent – prompting him to claim he needed to pick up his dry cleaning and going on the run.

The barrister added that in 1996 the Belgian national was convicted of impersonating someone else and falsifying documents in his home country.

It was reported by the media in that same year that Trusgnach had caused a political scandal by claiming he had sex with Belgium’s then deputy prime minister, Elio Di Rupo, when he was working as an under-age prostitute.

The claims were never proven and Mr Di Rupo was elected as the country’s Prime Minister in 2011.

Mr Harvey, who runs the antique dealers in Corn Street, said he hired private detectives to find Trusgnach, who was going by the name Oliver von Mecklenburg-Schwerin.

Last year the conman was discovered living in Mallorca after he texted a friend in the US, who then contacted Mr Harvey.

Speaking after the sentencing, the businessman and West Oxfordshire district councillor described his former employee as “a consummate con artist”.

Mr Harvey said: “He had an excellent CV and he came highly recommended.

“It took us more than a year to get the whole thing sorted out. It was a huge distraction. It certainly impacted upon the business and it has impacted on the trust that you put in people going forward.

“It made me very angry to see him again.

“I’m still angry at him for what he’s done, the lives he has damaged. It was a difficult period but we got over it. Seeing him sentenced to 27 months gave us some closure.”

However, Mr Harvey added he thought gaining a total of £115, 775.05 for what would end up being about 13-and-half months in prison seemed like “not a bad wage”.

His partner Chrissie Curry added: “It was very, very upsetting for everyone. It damaged our name as a business – a number of people ended up calling up demanding money and demanding goods because of what he did.”

Trusgnach was detained under a European Arrest Warrant on July 7 last year. He admitted one count of theft and one count of forgery.

Mark Dixon, defending, said his client had been living a “party lifestyle” in London and had become addicted to alcohol and cocaine. He said: “Mr Trsgnach got into a lifestyle that he couldn’t fund legitimately.

“But it certainly wasn’t his intention to attempt to defraud the company from the outset.”

Judge Ian Pringle said the defendant had been “a very trusted person who had the confidence of his employer, no doubt because of how he portrayed himself”.

He told Trusgnach: “From the very start you were abusing the position of trust you held within the company.

“Behaving as if you were some form of aristocracy, your life became increasingly out of control.”

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