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Shamed undertaker Michael O’Brien has been jailed for eight months after trousering money that mourners had donated to charity.

O’Brien, 59, collected £1,935 in cash and cheques left in envelopes by grieving well-wishers after funeral services - but the money never reached the good causes.

He pocketed £530 in cash donations and never bothered to forward the rest of the money in the form of cheques.

The money had been left in envelopes which also contained cards with heart-felt messages of support which he also failed to forward to grieving families.

He also conned elderly people arranging their funerals.

O’Brien has been jailed after he admitted fraud and offences under unfair trading regulations.

Minshull Street Crown Court in Manchester heard he took advantage of a series of vulnerable clients even though he knew his struggling family business, Murray’s Funeral Services in Dukinfield, Greater Manchester, had gone bankrupt.

O’Brien, of Hollingworth, Greater Manchester, had also mis-sold a series of funeral plans to elderly people worth a total of £10,219.

Old folk keen not to burden surviving relatives had paid him up to £3,000 for their funerals once they were gone.

But the court heard none of the plans was backed by insurance and O’Brien had not been regulated as required by the Financial Conduct Authority.

It meant families didn’t realise they risked losing their money if, as happened, his business went bankrupt.

Although O’Brien never failed to provide a funeral, the money he took for funeral plans went into propping up his failing business rather than into holding accounts for his customers.

Jailing him, Judge Andrew Lowcock told O’Brien: “It’s very sad to see you in the dock of the crown court. You had, prior to these events, led a blameless life.

"Your offences were committed against people at their most vulnerable, whether through illness, age or bereavement.

"Trying to support your business was not an excuse. In my view an immediate custodial sentence is inevitable.”

O’Brien, who had no previous convictions, showed no reaction as he was led down to begin his jail sentence.

Earlier, Simeon Evans, defending, said: “He would say he’s a very good undertaker and a very, very bad businessman.”

Francis Hancock’s grieving family paid £1,080 to O’Brien for a headstone - but the undertaker did nothing except pocket the cash.

Retired builder Francis, a dad of four with seven grandchildren, died aged 64 of cancer, and friends recommended O’Brien to arrange the funeral.

It went well and the family, from Ashton-under-Lyne, went to O’Brien again for the headstone.

Francis’s daughter Fiona Smith, 39, confronted the undertaker after a series of delays and later learned, despite assurances from him that everything would be fine, he had gone bankrupt.

They also realised he had pocketed cash donations meant for Macmillan Cancer Care.

After watching him being jailed, Fiona said: “I think he was deceitful and preyed on vulnerable people, and my dad especially.

"We trusted him completely. This was justice for Dad really, not for us. It was his money. He would have been fuming.”

The court heard O’Brien took over what transpired to be a failing business from his father and that later his mum took her own life.

“He feels very keenly the shame that’s been brought upon him,” his barrister said.