A former solicitor sentenced to five years in prison for fraud in 2002 lost his appeal against a confiscation order for 181,750 this month.

Christopher Trietline - a former solicitor from Hereford - received the sentence for fraudulent activity with another director of a haulage company and an accountant.

Sentencing Trietline then, Judge Adele Williams said: 'You are by far the most intelligent and manipulative of the three defendants and it was you who stood to gain most financially.'

Subsequently, Trietline attempted to reverse a confiscation order made against him, claiming that he did not own a share in a partnership with his wife and mother.

But the Court of Appeal held this month that he owned 90% of the venture, and that he had failed to disclose substantial hidden assets which were the proceeds of undeclared trading in racehorses.

Trietline ceased being a solicitor in 1997.

.Jeremy Fleming