When Tony and Jill Lewis flew out to England for a holiday in 2013, they didn’t foresee life going this way on their return.
First stop after arriving back in Sydney was to the home of their son Russell where all seemed normal – less than an hour later Mr and Mrs Lewis realised it wasn’t.
Walking back into their home in the city’s far west they found that not only had their home been ransacked, but also their bank accounts to the tune of almost $50,000.
Instantly Mr and Mrs Lewis realised their son and his girlfriend were behind the theft.
Russell and his partner Sarah Flegg were both convicted on multiple counts of fraud and aggravated burglary and jailed in January last year, leaving their young daughter in the care of her grandparents.
According to Mr and Mrs Lewis, they never want to see their son again – and do not want him going near the beautiful granddaughter they call their ‘little madame’.
Tony and Jill Lewis (pictured) want their son deported back to their homeland of England after he and his girlfriend stole almost $50,000 from their bank accounts while they were overseas
Russell Lewis (pictured) and Sarah Flegg ransacked the couple’s accounts after stealing their passwords
‘We went overseas in November and came back in January 2014. When we walked in to the house it was ransacked – there was just stuff everywhere,’ Mr Lewis told Daily Mail Australia.
‘They took all of the $11,500 we’d left in our account, plus more than $50,000 from the credit cards. The bank actually stopped the last two transaction attempts which were $15,000 and $5,000.
‘We were just shattered, absolutely shattered that he could do this to us.’
From alcohol addiction to ongoing health issues after a serious car crash, Mr and Mrs Lewis admit they had faced a number of problems with their son over the years.
But they never saw this coming and lay much of the blame at the feet of his partner, Sarah.
‘She’s the main one. Russell had a stroke when he was 20, he can’t spell. He can get on Facebook, but use a computer to steal all that money…? No way,’ Mrs Lewis said.
‘Whatever help he wanted over the years – we helped him get his house, helped him get his first car, when he had his stroke I nursed him for 12 months – he got it.
‘He’d come up and say, can I have some money for this or that and we’d give it to him, he never went without anything.
Shattered: Mr and Mrs Lewis say they had experienced some troubles with their son, but never saw this coming
Mr Lewis and Russell together in happier times, years before he was jailed for defrauding them
‘He never went without anything’: Mr and Mrs Lewis say they cared for their son into his adult years after he fell into alcohol addiction, even lending him money just hours before they flew overseas in 2014
‘We’d obviously had some troubles, but it was when she turned up on the scene that things really started to go bad.’
So angry are the couple that they have called on Immigration Minister Peter Dutton to deport Russell back to Britain, their homeland.
They say what made his crime worse was just hours before they flew overseas he had visited them with their granddaughter to say farewell.
‘Russell came up the morning we were leaving and he brought our granddaughter to say goodbye to nan and grandad,’ Mrs Lewis said.
‘While he was here he asked me if we had any money, because he said he didn’t have enough to buy the kids Christmas presents.
‘I gave him some money, I can’t remember if it was $600 or $800, and he said thanks mum, kissed me goodbye, and that was it.
‘Not long later they’d broken in and were stealing out money. Before that he’d taken a few things from us, but nothing to this level.’
The theft not only left Mr and Mrs Lewis substantially out of pocket, but also forced them to rethink their plans for retirement.
Mr and Mrs Lewis sit outside the western Sydney rental home they share with their six-year-old granddaughter
The couple were forced to shelve their retirement plans in their 60s to again take up the role of parents for their ‘Little Madame’
Russell’s partner Sarah Flegg was also convicted of defrauding Mr and Mrs Lewis. She is now serving a jail sentence in Silverwater Prison, while Russell is currently in Long Bay Jail
Gone was any hope for further travel with the couple forced to suddenly pick up the role as parents in their sixties.
Instead of retiring at their large rural farm as they had hoped they were also forced to move back into the suburbs, renting a home near their granddaughter’s school.
With the farm gone the couple decided to buy a block of land in town, hoping to one day turn that into their retirement home.
Now they can no longer afford to finish the building.
In addition to the enormous sum of money, Russell and Sarah also stole a number of expensive household items including a TV, vacuum and pusher pram.
It was these things that led Mr and Mrs Lewis to immediately correctly suspect who it was that had stolen from them.
But the Commonwealth Bank initially accused Mr Lewis of conspiring with his son on the theft, claiming in a letter that the pair were involved in a scam.
The bank has since apologised to the Lewis’ and repaid them the $11,500 cash stolen from their account, covered almost $10,000 in legal fees and waived some $50,000 in stolen credit card funds
The couple sold their rural property following the fraud incident and bought a block of land in Sydney’s western suburbs
The Commonwealth Bank has reimbursed the Lewis’ for the money stolen by their son (left) and offered them a $3,000 ‘goodwill payment’
In addition to offering them a $3,000 ‘goodwill payment’, the CBA also cleared a loan overdraft and apologised in a statement.
‘We are sorry for the situation Mr and Mrs Lewis have found themselves in,’ the bank said.
‘We have met with them, and as we committed to, we have offered a goodwill payment to waive all outstanding debts as well as cover legal fees and money towards the inconvenience of having outstanding funds as a result of the fraud.’
But Mr and Mrs Lewis claim that having had to fight for four years to get the ‘goodwill payment’, the amount offered is not enough.
‘It’s good of them, but it’s taken four years and if they had just offered this initially it would not have been such an issue,’ Mr Lewis said.
‘Now we are left $50,000 short of finishing our house and not sure what to do next, when we should be just enjoying our retirement.’
Mr and Mrs Lewis say they have been left $50,000 short of being able to complete a new home they plan to retire in, and are not sure what they will do next