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A top executive at a housing charity conned them out of £325,000 to buy a chain of Coventry sandwich bars, a court heard.

Lakhbir Jaspal, from Gaydon , already earned £147,000-a-year as the deputy chief executive of Accord Group - an organisation that receives government grants to build affordable homes for low-income families and vulnerable people.

But despite his six figure salary and luxurious lifestyle he submitted a series of invoices between 2011 and 2012 from a bogus firm he created purely to steal from the charity.

The 47-year-old fabricated six bills - the largest for £97,980 - from a mystery firm called Serus but when Jaspal was confronted he admitted the theft and he was reported to the police.

He was arrested at his mansion - complete with indoor pool and gym - in Kineton Road, Gaydon in August.

In interview Jaspal claimed he was in need of cash to fund his frail mum’s residential care.

But West Midlands Police rubbished his sob story after finding out the care was NHS funded and the family had splashed £13,000 in two months on jewellery.

Jaspal later admitted that the cash had been used to buy Subway franchises in Coventry.

He bought his first franchise in the firm at Arena Park in December 2012 for £245,000 and handed over a cheque for £97,000 on April 1 this year to buy a second outlet in Jubilee Crescent, Radford .

When he was arrested he was in the process of acquiring a third franchise for a new build restaurant at Gallagher Retail Park.

At Birmingham Crown Court on Friday he admitted eight counts of fraud by abuse of position and was jailed for three years.

Det Con Mark Delaney said: “It is a classic case of pure greed. Not satisfied with a £147,000 a year salary he spotted an opportunity to defraud the company - one that is part funded by the taxpayer - to line his own pockets.

“Jaspal hid the Serus invoices in a new initiatives account, he was the principal budget holder with responsibility for monitoring and authorising expenditure.

“He is a qualified accountant and abused his accountancy skills and his senior position to hide the fictitious invoices in Accords’ account figures.

“It’s particularly distasteful he tried claiming he needed the money to pay for his mother’s end of life care - but our inquiries showed she was admitted to a home in December 2013, more than 12 months after his last successful fraudulent invoice.

“Jaspal admitted the fraud and has agreed to pay all the money back plus a substantial amount towards Accord’s legal costs, but this sentence shows the courts take a dim view of trust abuses like this and that offenders can expect to be jailed.”

A spokesperson for West Bromwich company Accord added: “We were shocked and disappointed with the actions of this one individual within our company who abused his position to steal.”