Newcastle businessman Lemuel Page. The 48-year-old's business history came to light this month after he was sentenced to at least eight months in jail for giving his friend a fake diamond ring. Page told the victim he could source him a diamond worth $200,000-$250,000 for a wholesale price of $85,000. Page eventually delivered the ring to his friend's fiancee in 2011. However the soon-to-wed couple discovered Page had a cubic zirconia fitted into an engagement ring rather than the real deal. Page was sentenced to at least eight months' jail on July 6 but released on bail pending an appeal.

According to a trustee report compiled by Geoffrey McDonald in August 2015, Page claimed he had no real estate interests, one car that he owned money on and a string of failed investments. At that point he only had $200 cash to his name, the report detailed. Page, who was behind the failed bid to redevelop the Newcastle's Lynch Prawn site in 2010, told the trustee a property in Ashfield, in Sydney's inner-west, was in his grandmother's name. A sprawling block of land in Mayfield was bought in a four-person agreement, Page claimed, but the property was later repossessed by the bank. The Newcastle apartment he lived in is owned by a trust controlled by his ex-wife Fiona Page. A Mercedes SL55K had also been moved into his ex-wife's name and he still owed $35,367 on a Toyota Hilux.

This was of little comfort to the people – including a childhood friend, real estate agent and tradesman – he befriended before leaving them thousands of dollars out of pocket. Much of the debt Page accumulated came after he invited friends to invest in shares that were likely to pay high returns, or in developments in which he was involved. According to another report in 2015, compiled after a meeting with creditors, there was a general belief Page had tied his valuable assets up in trusts. "... It is apparent that the debtor has, for several years structured his financial affairs by way of trusts," the report stated. "This is reflected in the lack of real property and asset holdings in his name.

"Further access to information from these entities, which are not or were not controlled by the debtor, is limited for that reason." An unsecured creditors list from August 2015 showed Page owed $5.8 million to Sydney cosmetic dentist Dr Angelo Lazaris, $2.7 million to a locksmith and $2.8 million to a man named Donald Munro. However, little detail is provided about what those loans or investments were for. When Fairfax Media emailed Dr Lazaris for a response on Thursday, he replied that he was not available for an interview. A district court judgment from 2010 revealed how Mayfield businessman Steve Josifovski came to invest tens of thousands of dollars with Page, a friend from primary school.

After crossing paths as adults in Newcastle in the early 2000s, Page told his former classmate he was "doing very well" as a share trader and property developer. Mr Josikovski provided $137,521 to Page, after being told the developer had received returns of up to 200 per cent on share transactions. Mr Josifovski also invested in developments in which Page claimed to have an influential foothold. In one case, Page convinced Mr Josifovski the redevelopment of the South Sydney Hospital site was a "goer". He even took him on a walk-through at the site. It was only in the lead up to Mr Josifovski's lawsuit against Page that the ripped off investor learned the site he toured was actually disused and no firm development proposal existed.

Page falsified business documents, using outdated company names on letterheads and incorrectly dated invoices, in an attempt to create a paper trail of Mr Josifovski's investments. But on August 18, 2010, Judge Margaret Sidis ruled in Mr Josifovski's favour and ordered Page pay Ms Josifovski and his company almost $250,000 plus legal costs. Loading As of 2016, Mr Josifovski was one on a long list of people Page still owed money to. Last November, Page signed a $180,000 personal insolvency agreement that saved him from debt toppling over the edge into bankruptcy.