What an absolute nightmare.
Your stag or hen do is supposed to be a time of fun and relaxation. If you’re lucky, your friends organise the whole thing, leaving you to do nothing more than board a plane/car/bus/boat/train to wherever it’s being held.
Once there, you party it up in your chosen manner, enjoying an incredible time before going and marrying the love of your life. Simple as.
Unless of course you trust the wrong person to do the requisite booking of flights, hotels etc. and end up discovering immediately beforehand that they have in fact spent all of the money themselves.
That is unfortunately exactly what happened to Ben Whincup, from Swindon, who had trusted his best man with £8,000 which was supposed to be used to organise a stag do in Las Vegas.
While there, Whincup had planned to meet with three friends from his local rugby league club, his father Craig, his two brothers-in-law and a family friend.
“I’d always dreamed of playing the tables in those iconic casinos and what better time than just before I get married?” said Whincup.
“We had decided on the flights and the hotel on the strip where we would stay, and he just said he’d take care of it all.
“We handed over more than £700 each and trusted him to deliver the dream trip. In the weeks running up to the stag, we were all getting excited and there were no signs that anything was wrong.”
It wasn’t until the night they were set to fly out for the stag that his hitherto best man broke the news.
He said: “I could not believe what I was hearing. I never even got angry really, it was just shock and disbelief.
“You can’t believe someone would do something like that. So we’ve gone from thinking we’d be at a pool party in Vegas to sat having a beer in Swindon.”
Rather than enjoy their time in Sin City, the groom and his mates were forced to have a few pints in Swindon instead.
Wiltshire police confirmed that a man was arrested on suspicion of fraud by false representation and has been released under investigation while enquiries continue, saying: “We can confirm this matter is being investigated. It would be inappropriate to comment further.”
