A BIG-HEARTED community volunteer swindled by a serial conman is glad he has gone to jail but says it will take much longer than his short sentence for her to learn to trust again. 

"The money I lost was tough but the biggest thing was that he took away my faith in mankind," said long-time Cairns hairdresser Jo Lees, who was conned into giving the man a haircut on credit and $420 cash.

"He just seemed like someone down on his luck."

Gregory Allan Trackson, 49, of Edmonton, was sentenced to nine months’ jail for five counts of fraud in Cairns Magistrates’ Court yesterday, but with early parole and two months already served, will be out on
October 31.

Acting Magistrate Kerry McFadden told Trackson the early release was so he could go back to work as a pump fitter "because you’ve got a lot of money to repay to all those people".

The court heard Trackson racked up about $2000 worth of bills at Ingham and Cairns during April and May, staying at motels and resorts where he booked up phone calls and room service then left without paying.

Police prosecutor Dorothy Bishop said Trackson used the same hard-luck story to everyone – that he had just arrived in town, that his luggage was lost in transit and that he had no money, ID or clothes.

When Trackson got to Mrs Lee’s business, Jo’s Scissors of Gold, he convinced her to give him a haircut and $70 cash, saying he would pay her back that afternoon when his wallet was returned.

But Senior Constable Bishop said that afternoon when Trackson returned, it was to ask for another $150, which Mrs Lees gave him.

He then came back the next day and Mrs Lees gave him another $200.

Yesterday, Mrs Lees, a tireless community worker who has been awarded for her 40 years of service to Girl Guiding in Cairns and who has helped strangers in need many times, said she was sure the police thought she was "an oddity".

"They didn’t say anything but I’m sure they couldn’t believe I could be so stupid," she said. "They thought I was just an easy touch but I thought he was in trouble … when he said his luggage was gone and his wife was away so he couldn’t get into the house, everything sounded plausible."

But Mrs Lees said her biggest regret was that she rang a local motel where she knew the owner and vouched for the man to stay there without a credit card.

"Then he did the same to them," she said.

"So I’m glad he’s been caught and glad he’s in jail and I just hope he can’t do it to anyone else. I don’t want to see him again, ever."

Trackson, who has a lengthy criminal history including convictions for 15 counts of fraud, was also charged with stealing a mobile phone from Cloncurry copper mine where he was working in August last year and making $934 worth of calls, and in Townsville, unlawful use of a motor vehicle, driving with a blood alcohol level of .203 per cent and unlicensed driving.

He was sentenced to nine months each for the stealing and fraud charges, fined $1300 for drink-driving, $200 for unlicensed driving and was disqualified from driving for 12 months.

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