A builder at war with his 'greedy' sister and brother-in-law over their property tycoon mother's £5million fortune says she would be 'turning in her grave' if she knew how they had frittered away his inheritance.

Sandra Thomas and her husband Philip were ordered this week to pay back £2.6million after a judge ruled the couple had acted out of 'greed' and misused more than £1million from their elderly mother's accounts.

The judge said the couple used Jeanne MacDougall’s £5million fortune as their own ‘personal piggy bank’ as they splashed the cash on exotic holidays, meals out at The Ivy, cars, and even a wedding for their daughter at the Savoy.

Jeanne’s eldest son Gary MacDougall will now receive around £1.6million following the six-year High Court battle between the estranged siblings over their mother's estate.

Until his mother passed away, her oldest child, Mr MacDougall had long assumed her estate would be split equally between himself and his sister - but he ended up inheriting almost nothing.

In a complicated financial arrangement, Mr MacDougall was due to receive property while his sister and her husband were due to receive fewer properties and whatever cash was left over in Jeanne’s account when she died.

But over the years leading up to her death the couple persuaded her to re-write her will leaving almost all of the properties to them as well as the money, leaving Mr MacDougall with almost nothing.

He claimed they then set about plundering her account ‘as an advance on their inheritance’ to fritter away vast sums of money on exotic trips and lavish meals out.

Mr MacDougall said as her health deteriorated, she didn’t realise the significance of changing her will. And while she sat in her care home, her credit card was being used all over the world.

But after the judge ruled his sister and her husband had to repay almost half of the estimated total value of Mrs MacDougall's estate, her son breathed a sigh of relief and told the Daily Mail: 'Justice has been done. But my sister and I will never speak again. My parents would be turning in their graves seeing my sister and I fighting each other.'

Reacting to the ruling, he said: 'I'm quite happy. I set out to right a wrong and I think the case has proved that. So yeah, I'm very pleased with the outcome.

'Her husband was the driving force behind it all and he's got off lightly. The judge called him greedy. 

'If you thought Sandra was a difficult witness, there was nothing compared to Philip. He tried to bamboozle everybody but the judge was right on it. She picked up on pretty much everything.

'The judge made the point that my sister had left her financial life up to my dad while he was alive and once he passed away, Philip took over.

'I'm sure she didn't really know everything that was going on.

'That's my little sister. I'd like to stand up for her but I'm finding it very difficult. The situation is we'll never speak again, I'm sure.'

Mr MacDougall said he has now been proven correct after previously describing the pair's behaviour as 'not just morally wrong - it's criminally wrong'.

He said: 'It could very much have gone the other way. But I wouldn't have pursued it so vigorously if I hadn't thought I had a very good chance of success.

'The power of attorney abuse was just phenomenal. My mum was in a care home and her debit card was being used all around the world.

'That card went on the most exotic holidays it's ever been on. They had to be pulled to task for that. Justice has been done. It's been served.

'They won't have it in cash under the bed to pay me, so there may be some horse trading to go on.

'The figures were wrong because everything goes back into the estate and anything I get is subject to 40 per cent inheritance tax, so the Government has done very well out of it.

'But it's been a long road. It's been six years since my mum died but I was aware of the shenanigans long before that. Really I've been fighting this for maybe ten years.

'It's taken its toll on my health and my finances as well because the costs were phenomenal.

'I've had to finance it all the way through, although ultimately I will get reimbursed. It does feel good to be proven right. I set out to right a wrong and I've definitely done that.

'My parents would be turning in their graves seeing my sister and I fighting each other. That side of it gives me no satisfaction but at the end of the day I had to make a stand.

'I'd just like to thank the judge for her patience and understanding because all our dirty washing was aired in the courtroom. She came to the right decision in the end.'

Mr MacDougall, who sold his plumbing and bathroom company in Acton, west London, to cover vast sums in his legal challenge, said he enjoyed a bottle of champagne with his family after the hearing.

But he failed to persuade the judge that Mrs MacDougall wasn't in her right mind when she cut him out of her final will, made in 2011.

Under the will, the Thomases got the properties Mrs MacDougall owned at death and the cash in her accounts.

But Mr MacDougall’s share will now be significantly swelled by a Peacehaven holiday home worth £400,000 and flats in Ealing, west London worth £1.2million which Mrs MacDougall was ‘unduly influenced’ to sign over to the Thomases before she died.

Mr MacDougall will also inherit half of the money they took, thought to be more than £1million, while the three properties are valued at £1.6million.

Judge Nicola Rushton KC ruled that acting out of 'greed,' Mrs Thomas and her husband misused more than £1million of Jeanne's money as a 'personal piggy' bank in an 'extensive and wholesale' way, using her accounts 'as if they were their own'.

'Suffice it to say, the misuse of Jeanne's bank accounts by Sandra and Philip was extensive and wholesale,' she said in her judgment.

'Jeanne's accounts and her assets were simply used by Sandra and Philip as if they were their own, without any regard whatsoever for any fiduciary duties, or even familial obligations to Jeanne.'

During the trial in February, the judge heard the MacDougall family fortune derived from the siblings' property developer father Alec MacDougall's 'substantial real estate portfolio'.

Development properties were mainly bought up in the Acton and Ealing areas of west London, renovated and rented out, generating significant profits.

For Mr MacDougall, barrister Harry Martin claimed that it had been made clear to the two siblings by their parents that they would ultimately receive 'broadly equal financial treatment and inheritance'.

This included his father insisting to Mr MacDougall that he would not require a significant pension pot as he would inherit property on which to live on in his retirement, said the barrister.

Following his death, Mrs MacDougall made a will in 2008 which Mr Martin said amounted to a 'broadly equal' split between her son and his family on one side and daughter and son-in-law on the other.

Under that will, Mr MacDougall would receive properties in Avenue Crescent and Berrymead Gardens, while Mrs Thomas got houses in Stuart Road and Avenue Gardens, and most of the cash in her bank accounts.

But another will was made in 2011, under which all four properties went to his sister and brother-in-law who would continue to receive the majority of her savings.

The siblings would then split what was left, but due to the costs and expenses of estate administration, that was 'likely to be worth nil,' Mr Martin said.

Mr MacDougall, who had worked with his mother in the family business, claimed the will was invalid as Mrs MacDougall had by then 'lost almost all of her independence'.

The pensioner also lacked the necessary mental capacity due to dementia when she signed the will and did not properly understand its effect, he claimed.

And he also laid claim to a share of more than £1million of his mother's money, which he said was 'misappropriated' from her bank accounts before she died and spent by his sister and brother-in-law on themselves and their family.

For the Thomases, who have now separated, Alexander Learmonth KC said they accept overstepping their duties under a lasting power of attorney by spending Jeanne's money on themselves.

However, he said it was essentially 'an advance on their inheritance' because most of her cash was destined for Sandra under both the 2008 and 2011 wills anyway.

Giving judgment on the case, Judge Rushton found that Mrs MacDougall's 2011 will was not tainted by undue influence, nor by mental frailness.

'Jeanne was genuinely very grateful to Sandra and Philip for the home and the support they had been giving her,' she said.

'It is unsurprising that she wanted to express her generous nature by rewarding them.'

But she ruled that their actions had depleted the value of the estate.

She found that the transfers of a £400,000 holiday home in Peacehaven, East Sussex, and two flats in Ealing, west London, worth about £1.2million were the result of their 'undue influence' on her.

'In my view, the likeliest explanation for the transfer of Peacehaven is simply that Philip and Sandra persuaded Jeanne to do it, probably over an extended period, and that justifications such as that Gary already had a holiday home in Cyprus, or had already 'had enough' from the business, were not so much Jeanne's as the ones they used to win her over,' she said.

'It is also in the nature of undue influence that it works in the shadows.

She said an account would have to be taken of the money spent by the couple to determine what they must pay to the estate as compensation, which would then be split with Mr MacDougall.

The exact value of the multimillion-pound estate has still to be calculated but the Thomases will still get at least double the £1.3million Gary is in line for under the upheld will.