A REDDITCH rogue builder who left a Halesowen house flooded after pocketing over £23,000 as an initial payment for work on the property has been locked up for 15 months.

In just four weeks Wayne Hay frittered away the money given to him by Krekar Kawani for a long term building project at the house in Woodbury Road.

After being taken on to carry out the six stage £70,000 project it was two weeks before any men reported for work at the house, said Mr Richard Francks prosecuting.

All they did then was strip old paper off walls before leaving and they returned the following month when they knocked out an internal wall.

Then, when Mr Kawani visited the property he hoped would become his long term home he discovered the ground floor was under water because the workmen had burst a pipe.

He continually tried to contact Hay to get the work done or to refund his money but with little success and in the end he alerted Dudley Council's Trading Standards department.

Hay of Corner Lane, Webheath, Redditch admitted running a fraudulent business and Judge Amjad Nawaz told him the only sentence that could be imposed for the serious crime was immediate imprisonment.

In a victim impact statement Mr Kawani described how he had been badly affected by the actions of Hay and they had had a "devastating" effect on his life.

He said he had lost a large part of his savings and the crime had left him close to an "emotional breakdown."

Mr Harpreet Sandhu defending Hay said he had been distracted at the time by the breakdown of his relationship and he had failed to treat the matter seriously.

Wolverhampton Crown Court was told Hay had been trading as Inside and Out Property Refurbishments and Mr Kawani had given him over £23,000 for the first stage and some of the second stage of the project.

Trading Standards officers estimated the work that was carried out on the property was worth around £2,000, said Mr Francks.