SAS FAKER STOLE FROM WAR HERO FATHER
A FANTASIST unmasked after claiming to be an SAS hero who saved Prince George from a terror attack has been jailed for stealing thousands of pounds off his 94-year-old war veteran dad.
Hotel worker Edward Stewart posed as a member of the elite unit to impress women but was exposed by online military vigilante group The Walter Mitty Hunters Club in 2016.
After making a grovelling apology to his dad David Brunton – who served in the Grenadier Guards in World War II – Stewart was welcomed back into the family and moved in with him.
But instead of shopping for his father and helping manage his finances Stewart ‘abused that trust for his own personal gain’, York crown court heard.
He used his dad’s debit card to make payments and withdraw money. His sister Francesca investigated and Stewart admitted stealing £1,666. But the family suspected many more withdrawals and called police. Stewart, 53, admitted one count of fraud and his family asked for other charges to lie on file. Jailing him for eight months, Judge Simon Hickey called him a ‘complete Walter Mitty character’ adding: ‘Your elderly and now frail father is, in contrast to you, a man of impeccable character. ‘He’s one of the few remaining veterans from the war who, as such, should have been cherished by you – not defrauded in the way you had.’ Stewart’s SAS lies included saving the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, protecting Princess Diana and Brad Pitt, knowing Bear Grylls and having to kill a young goat herder in Iraq.