If it looks too good to be true . . .

. . . it probably is.

The wisdom of this old saying has been rediscovered by Mr. Terry Collins of England. He was offered the chance to buy the Ritz Hotel in London from its notoriously secretive owners, the Barclay brothers, for a bargain price - only £250 million, compared to its estimated value of £600 million.




That discrepancy alone should have set the alarm bells ringing in Mr. Collins' head, but he pursued the deal. He ended up borrowing a million pounds to put down as a deposit on the deal and obtain the release of a reputed 27 boxes of legal documents.

You won't be surprised to hear that the purported sellers, Anthony Lee and Patrick Dolan, promptly disappeared with the deposit.

Lee turned out to be an unemployed lorry driver and bankrupt with no connections whatsoever to the brothers.

Dolan, too, was unemployed.

The elaborate fraud emerged yesterday in a judgment handed down at the High Court in London as the two victims of the fraud battled over the £ 1million which was immediately spent by Lee and Dolan.

Lee, 47, bought a £55,000 Land Rover as a Christmas present for his girlfriend Jennifer Hodgson, then took her on a luxury cruise.

He sent £59,000 to his creditors and paid rent arrears on his Yorkshire bungalow.

Dolan, 66, bought a Mercedes for £43,000 and splashed out on a lavish day at Cheltenham races, where he bet and lost heavily.

He paid off the £30,000 mortgage on his house in Barnet, North London, and paid £293,410 to his wife.

The Dutch businessman who loaned the money to Mr. Collins is now suing to get it back, and the whole affair is degenerating into farce and shambles. Amazingly, neither Lee nor Dolan has yet been arrested! I imagine that will change soon - at least, I hope it will . . .

What was that other old saying about a fool and his money - or borrowed money, for that matter?

*Sigh*

Peter