The tense interview baby-faced real estate agent gave to cops after she swindled pensioner couple out of their $90,000 life savings – and spent it on clothes, salon visits and a Mercedes

A real estate agent who used sweet talk to steal more than $90,000 from an elderly couple told police she “didn’t mind” because she would pay the money back.

Hayley Philpot was 29 and pregnant with her second child when she was sentenced to three months in prison in April. She pleaded guilty to obtaining a power of attorney to obtain financial advantage.

Newly released footage of her police interview shows Philpot telling detectives she had agreed to pay back the money – which she had spent on clothes, hairdressers and a Mercedes – despite her victim being unaware she had taken the cash.

Philpot helped sell Berwyn and Keith Bennett’s house, but then cruelly spent $98,844.80 of their pension money when she gained access to their bank accounts. Mrs. Bennett thought she was trying to help them move into a nursing home.

In a recording of a police interrogation obtained by A current casePhilpot brazenly told a detective: ‘I didn’t take anything that (Mrs. Bennett) didn’t say yes to.’

When Detective Philpot asked incredulously about the specific amounts of $40,000 and $12,500, she denied that too, saying her victim had consented to it.

‘Then she said yes. It wasn’t it like I went behind her back and thought, ‘I’m going to roll this old lady’.

A distraught Mrs Bennett, 83, told the programme that Philpot was lying and claimed she was ‘lying all the time’.

The case began in 2019, when Mr Bennett had to move into a nursing home because his dementia had become so severe that his wife could no longer care for him.

They went to the estate agency Savoy Real Estate and met Philpot, who sold their house for them and gained their trust, which she would soon brutally abuse.

Philpot offered to help the couple with their day-to-day finances. They gave her power of attorney and from that moment on their money started to disappear.

But they were unaware of this as Philpot used her privileges to access the couple’s online banking, setting up the ‘tap-and-go’ function on her phone using Mrs Bennett’s debit card and forwarding statements to her address.

Between May 2020 and August 2021, Philpot made 98 different transactions ranging from Officeworks, Zara, JB Hi Fi and Nandos to multiple payments to Mercedes Benz for an A180 model car.

When she took Mrs. Bennet away in her Mercedes, to her surprise she asked if she enjoyed it.

“I said, ‘Oh no, I don’t like it, I think it’s too, too flashy,'” said Mrs Bennet, who was unaware that it was paid for with money stolen from her.

On 30 July 2021, the fraudster transferred $40,000 from Ms Bennett’s account, claiming she had asked him to do this while Centrelink was monitoring her account.

When police asked where the $40,000 had gone, Philpot replied, “Well, it’s not in my account.”

The detective continued to press, saying, “The money wasn’t put back into (Mrs. Bennett’s) account as you said… it went into your brother’s account.”

Her response to this was shocking in its insincerity. ‘But I don’t speak to Berwyn, so how would you like me to put it back?’

Mrs Bennett said: ‘Deep down I knew something was wrong.’

“She did everything she could to get that money from me until she got caught.”

Last April, Philpot was sentenced to three months in prison and ordered to pay restitution to her victims. She eventually pleaded guilty to stealing $98,844.80.

But she appealed and has not spent a day behind bars.

Mrs. Bennett feels guilty about a crime that was not her fault.

“The one who is hurt the most is my husband,” she said.

“I disappointed him. It’s not my money, it’s my husband’s money, his pension. He worked very hard for it.

“I still get mad, I still get angry. I still can’t believe she did it,” she said.

“I was an easy target because I was on my own, I had no family, no family, nothing. There was just Keith and me.”

Her advice to others is, “Be careful who you trust and never lend money to anyone.”

According to Ms. Bennett’s caregiver, Philpot has so far repaid the couple $30,000.

Philpot was ordered to repay the $68,844.80 still owed, in addition to the three-month prison sentence.

She left Savoy Real Estate Yarra Glen in 2020 and has since worked for several other real estate agencies.

Philpot described himself on LinkedIn as an experienced sales agent with a demonstrated history of working in the real estate industry.

Her appeal will be heard again in court on September 24.