A CONMAN behind a multi-million pound fraud has been ordered to pay back just a fraction of his criminal gains.

William Davenport, 61, a former bricklayer who was living on benefits duped a council into selling him the grade II listed childhood home of former Prime Minister Sir Anthony Eden.

In an audacious and "sophisticated" £2.9m fraud, Davenport spun a web of deceit that ensnared aristocrats and financiers on both sides of the Atlantic.

He was jailed for six years last September by a judge who told him: "You seek to give the appearance of wealth and standing, but you have searched for a lifestyle without any means of paying for it."

In buying sprawling Windlestone Hall, the 40-bedroom home of the 1950s Conservative Prime Minister near Newton Aycliffe, Davenport presented himself as a Beverley Hills-based tycoon who had previously lived in the £1m Great Brampton Hall in Herefordshire.

In fact, he was a near-penniless con artist, born William Green, who had hoodwinked Great Brampton's owners, Lord and Lady Pidgeon, into allowing him to register their home as his address.

Armed with the fake address, falsified documents claiming he earned £430,000-a-year and claiming he had a Barclays Wealth Account, Davenport fraudulently took a huge mortgage after tricking Durham County Council into believing he was a legitimate buyer.

Davenport, his wife, Ann, and daughter, Meaghan, said they would restore the 25-acre 19th century manor, described by English Heritage as one of the most important buildings in the north of England, to its former glory.

However an "eagle-eyed" mortgage clerk spotted a discrepancy in a single forged P60 document and the fraud "collapsed like a pack of cards".

Ann and Meaghan, said by the prosecution at Teesside Crown Court to be complicit in the scam, "fled jurisdiction" and are believed to be in hiding in the United States.

As police probed Davenport's background they discovered he had previously:

Bought the lease to Egerton stud farm in Newmarket in 2002 as Bill Green, only to vanish six month later when a bankruptcy petition was filed and change his name to William Carrington.

In September 2004, as William Carrington, bought Middleton Hall in Midlothian, Scotland, passing himself off as a wealthy American. Four years later he and his wife disappeared leaving debts to the bank of £93,513.

In 2005, despite having no legitimate income, "William Carrington" bought a property in Alabama, USA, only to later be found trying to re-enter the country with a passport in the name of David Lloyd.

In January 2010, he approached Lord and Lady Pidgeon the owners of Great Brampton Hall and offered to buy it for £1m. Having gained their trust as an apparently legitimate buyer he set up utility accounts using their home as his address to impress future con targets and distance himself from past bankruptcies.

Despite his long history of financial sharp practice, Davenport had no previous convictions before his appearance in court, when he admitted three counts of fraud regarding four mortgage applications and six counts of forging documents to support them.

A judge ruled yesterday Davenport's criminal activities earned him £837,756, but his available assets are just £100,500.

If he fails to meet the bill before December 19, he will face a further 18 months in jail.