Woman ordered to hand over £300,000 bequest from neighbour

A woman who was given nearly £300,000 by an elderly neighbour she helped in the last year of his life was ordered yesterday to pay back the money by three judges.

Susan Osborn, who lived in the same road as Dennis Pritler in Loughton, Essex, began shopping for him, paying him visits and making him tea after finding him holding on to railings and clearly in distress outside a supermarket in 1998.

She once found him collapsed under a table after an accident, got him to hospital and, when he returned, prepared two meals a day, paid his bills and bought him clothes.

But Sir Martin Nourse, giving the judgment at the Court of Appeal, said: "It's impossible to say that the gift was made by Mr Pritler only after full, free and informed thought about it."

Sir Martin, Lord Justice Keene and Lord Justice Ward agreed the money must be returned to Margaret Hammond, a cousin of Mr Pritler.

Mr Pritler, a retired teacher, first offered Mrs Osborn gifts in 1998 but she ignored him. After a second period in hospital, Mr Pritler insisted he would cash in his lifetime investments – £297,005 – and give the money to her. He told her where to find the paperwork to cash them in. This time she acted on his suggestion.

After Mr Pritler's death three years ago, Mrs Hammond won a freezing order against Mrs Osborn at the High Court. But at a later hearing, Mr Justice Mackay ruled that Mr Pritler did intend to give his money to Mrs Osborn as a gift and it could not be set aside on the ground that she unduly influenced him. Mrs Hammond took the case to the Court of Appeal. Jonathan Schoop, her solicitor, said yesterday that she was "extremely pleased" with the ruling.