A man who claimed his missing wife was behind a scheme to falsify documents to get a mortgage has avoided jail.
Daniel Belling, 49, pleaded guilty on his trial date to one count of dishonestly inducing the Bank of Ireland to providing a mortgage loan of €112,500 in March 2014.
On five other occasions, Belling used false documents on dates between July 1, 2013 and January 27, 2015 to attempt to apply for loans.
Passing sentence yesterday, Judge Martin Nolan said this offence was a ‘classic whitecollar crime’. The judge said that while Belling said his wife, who has been missing since 2017, was the driver of the scheme, he would take that explanation ‘with a pinch of salt’.
Belling, whose wife disappeared from a cruise ship while the couple were on holiday with their two children, is facing trial in Italy for the murder of Chinese national Xing Lei Li, 38 and disposing of her body in the sea. He denies any involvement in his wife’s disappearance.
At Dublin Circuit Criminal Court Róisín Lacey SC, defending, said Belling’s wife had been listed as a missing person since 2017 and that both Belling and his wife had obtained safety orders against each other during the course of their 17-year marriage. ‘Their relationship was tempestuous,’ she said.
Judge Nolan said he had reluctantly decided not to jail Belling, of Kilkee House Coolock, Dublin…
