A group of businessmen behind a huge mortgage scandal that rocked Eastbourne have escaped jail sentences.

The group included John Healy, 60, and Philip Pooley, 52, of estate agents Healy Partnership, and Sports Track bar owner Graham Meyer, 49.

The trio, based in Eastbourne, along with three others, duped banks and building societies into handing out mortgages worth £1.3 million using false identities.

They sold the properties to fake buyers and then rented them out to people on benefits.

The scam came to light when the loans fell into arrears and the homes had to be repossessed, leaving building societies £230,000 out of pocket.

At Middlesex Guildhall Crown Court they all admitted conspiracy to defraud between January 1992 and December 1995.

Healy, who was also press officer for the Old Town Boys Football Club, was sentenced to 200 hours' community service along with Pooley.

Rebecca Poulet QC, defending him, said he had enjoyed an "enviable reputation among the local community".

She added: "The loss of reputation, together with the loss of business, will be the real punishment for this crime."

Judge Duncan Matheson said: "It will put something back into the community and serve to remind you as well of what you have done."

Meyer was sentenced to the maximum community punishment of 240 hours.

Eric Godfrey, 52, of Regency Court, Withdean Rise, Brighton, was sentenced to 200 hours and Wendy Lawson, 46, of Goodwood Close, High Halstow, Rochester, Kent, will be sentenced later this month.

Lawson's husband Nigel, who died earlier this week, was also involved in some of the frauds.