UK woman jailed after pretending friend's child was her ex's as revenge

A UK woman who exacted revenge on her ex-boyfriend by convincing him she’d been raising his biological child has been jailed for fraud.

For five years, Tracey Hardy passed off a friend’s child as her own in order to dupe her ex partner, John, into paying $AU27,000 in child support and legal fees for custody hearings.

As documented in the first episode of BBC series Reported Missing, and reported by The Mirror, her deception was punishment for John dumping her via text at a time she believed she was pregnant.

Though the Macclesfield local quickly discovered she wasn’t expecting a child, she didn’t tell her former partner this was the case.

After not seeing his “son” in two years, John reported Tyler missing in 2017 - and it’s at this point his ex’s elaborate lie began to unravel.

Police initially thought the boy had been kidnapped or murdered; they also suspected John was delusional, as Hardy denied having a child and there were no records of his existence.