The man who tried to wallpaper his home with fake banknotes

Stephen Lee spent a year making made crude black-and white-photocopies of five, ten and 20 pound notes to paper the walls and a coffee table at his home in Scarborough.

He was caught when police were handed a bag full of the copies, and began searching his home.

At York Crown Court he was told that counterfeiting usually attracted a custodial sentence. But as his copies were not meant to be passed to the public, he escaped with a 12 month conditional discharge after pleading guilty.