THIS is the woman at the centre of a “cruel and sophisticated” fraud which robbed a couple of their dream of parenthood and of their savings.

University drop-out Samantha Cookes promised to be a surrogate mother for the childless North Yorkshire couple – but took them for all they had.

Cookes told a series of lies about her background and employment as she convinced her victims, who live in Northallerton, she was the ideal woman to carry their longed-for baby.

She said she was a social worker and had been a surrogate for a wealthy family in the Midlands – and provided references from the “grateful” mother.

The 23-year-old asked for money up-front – for contracts, legal fees, expenses and insemination kits – as the couple excitedly planned the pregnancy.

After parting with savings of more than £1,200, the couple were devastated when they realised she was a fraudster preying on their desperate situation.

Yesterday, Cookes walked free from court after a judge heard that she has been plagued by psychiatric problems since losing a child to cot death.

Recorder Ben Nolan said it was only the “complex psychological and emotional background” which had saved her immediate jail.

He told the former York University student: “Your victims were particularly vulnerable because their natural and unfulfilled desire was to have children.”

See tomorrow's Northern Echo for the couple's exclusive story