A CONMAN who swindled more than £1 million from car buyers has been ordered to repay just £80,000.

Ravinder Randhawa set up a string of fake websites which looked identical to those of luxury car dealers and stole deposits paid by 150 customers from all over the country including Devon who were duped by them.

Victims paid up to £17,500 for nearly-new Range Rovers, Mercedes-Benzes, Porsches and other luxury cars which were offered at big discounts.

Some travelled up to five hours across Britain to collect their cars, only to find the garages did not exist.

Randhawa made buyers send him images of their passports and driving licences and then stole their identities and used them when scamming other victims.

Some of them not only lost thousands of pounds but were wrongly identified as scammers on social media by later victims.

Randhawa taunted customers who asked for their money back with racist and sexual slurs, and calling them silly mugs who had ‘just bought a picture on the internet.

He told one health worker during the height of the Covid pandemic: ‘Don’t play the NHS card. Look at how many people are dying. Clapping NHS workers is a joke.’

He called one Muslim customer a terrorist who should go back to his own country and used the P word before making a vile sexual reference to his mother.

He told another: ‘You stupid ****, go eat bacon.’

Randhawa hid his tracks by laundering the money through other people’s accounts and bought gold bars and Rolex watches, some of which were seized when he was arrested.

A financial inquiry has identified assets of just over £80,000, including cash in bank accounts which were frozen after his arrest.

A Proceeds of Crime Act hearing at Exeter Crown Court was told that Randhawa’s benefit from his criminal lifestyle was £1,187,347.56 and the available amount is £80,981.61.

Judge David Evans ordered he hand over this amount within three months or face a further two years in jail.

Mr Richard Padley, defending, said the time would be needed to arrange for the cash to be transferred from bank accounts.

Randhawa, aged 30, of London Road, Ashford, Middlesex, admitted 22 counts of fraud and one of money laundering and was jailed for nine years by Recorder Miss Kate Brunner at Exeter Crown Court last year.

He appeared at the POCA hearing by video link from prison.

At his sentencing hearing, the court was told that the scam went on for three years with more than 150 victims and was unravelled by detectives from the Devon and Cornwall force who took over the inquiry from the Met because one of the victims came from Cornwall.

Mr David Sapiecha, prosecuting, said Randhawa set up the scam shortly after coming out of jail for earlier fraud offences in 2018 and ran it until 2020.

He advertised cars on the internet on sites which were indistinguishable from genuine luxury showrooms and then strung along potential buyer.

Many only lost a deposit but others were conned into paying the full price to ensure delivery. Many were fooled into giving personal details which enabled Randhawa to steal their identities and use them in future scams.

A large proportion of the cash was laundered through jewellers, who also became victims of the scam when some banks retrieved fraudulent payments.

One jeweller in Brighton helped police track down Randhawa after finding a picture of him showing off the Rolex which they sold him on Instagram.

When police raided Randhawa’s home in February, they found he had flushed several Sim cards down the toilet. They recovered only fake Rolexes because he had either sold or hidden the real ones.