Help with my legal fees

Aim

My ex business partner and parter in life partner stole over £36,000 off me and I need help with my legal fees to get the money back.

Hi All,

My name is Sarah Mansfield.

In August 2015 I started working for my partner. I gave a contracted £10,000 loan with high interest that he had put together the benefit both myself and the business. This also has a clause that I could get it back at any time with Just 3 months notice. This was money family had given me as I had just bought my first house and they had saved for me to have this money in case any extra payments were needed upon moving in.

I signed an employment  contract to say as the full time Office Manager I would earn £14,400 a year and would be paid  in monthly instalments of £1,200.  

I also was interested in investing in the business but not until I had spoken to the accountant and officially signed contracts. I had got the money in place ready however we agreed that until contracts that this was not to be touched. This was the amount that my grandmother had saved my entire life, it was £16,000 which is why I was being so cautious.

As we practically lived together and our relationship was going well I believed all of the excuses and reasons he was giving me about why I had not been paid month to month. However as he had all of my savings and he wasn't paying me it made my life very hard, at points I had no money for food or petrol. I was constantly going overdrawn and it was very stressful. I had also originally loaned him money for his flat deposit that he said he would give me back upon being paid my first months wage.

After 9 months  he broke up with me and told me I couldn't work at the company anymore and that he had spent all of my money and had nothing left to give me back. He promised he would start to pay me back and if it came to it he would pay my legal fees.

Months went by and he still wasn't paying me back. He hired a solicitor to put together a contract for all the money in which he put that he would pay all legal fees. He gave me an unsigned version of the document and kept arranging to sign it but never did. He emailed me confirming that he agrees to it and told me that legally it would be the same as signing it. Although now I know this not to be true.

In January 2017 I managed to find a solicitor to take my case. I had no money so I agreed no win no fee. As an average person is on the highest wage I have ever been on which is £15,000 for a management position that I work 56 hours a week for I did not expect the fees to be as high as they now are. My only other experience of having a solicitor was when buying my house and that cost around £1000 which I thought was expensive. 

My legal fees up to date are over £13,000 and it hasn't yet got to court and it seems to be rapidly getting higher.

I have been told that even if I win my ex partner is only responsible for paying a few hundred of this amount. The solicitors worked out that in total the amount I am owed is £45,000 but even if I win now a large amount will go to legal fees.

I would like to raise these fees because I was robbed of that money. It was taken against my will. I am not asking for any money for the stresss or hurt it caused, Just the exact amount that I should have had over a year ago that my family spend my life saving up and that I worked hard for.

This same person also took money from many clients and never gave them the product that they had paid for and again they could not get hold of him to get their money back so as far as I am aware I am one of 3 people taking him to court.

Please help me raise these funds for the costs to get my money back from this awful person.

This project closed unsuccessfully on 2nd October 2017