KEVIN Taylor has been promised by a Filipino judge he will learn his fate this month but hope is scant as successive hearing dates have come and gone.

Kevin, 49, originally of Swindon, along with wife Charlene, has been detained in San Mateo since 2009 on charges of defrauding jobseekers with promises of employment in the UK.

After a horrendously long judicial process and numerous hearings, during which Kevin has consistently denied the charges, he is now awaiting a final verdict in his acquittal hearing.

A provisional date of September 30 came and went with no progress, and subsequent opportunities for Kevin for be freed from his detention centre in Guitnang Bayan have proved equally fruitless.

Now Kevin has been told he will be given his final moment in court before the end of the month, but expectations from he and his family are at a low ebb.

“I am just waiting now for what the verdict will be and hopefully we will know this week,” Kevin said. “I have been waiting three months and it is kind of getting to us now.”

Kevin said the residing judge had expressed to him he would have his hearing by the end of October.

“The judge came to visit me over a month ago and I asked her when the verdict would be and she said October,” he said. “We are just waiting now for a subpoena to take us back to court. The judge is here again on October 25 so I will ask her again, when are we going to go home?

“It is just getting us down all the time now. Most of the day I am sleeping. I hurt my back by lying down so much, every time I get up my back hurts, and they are giving me painkillers for that. Most days I walk the pain off.

“We are just getting ready to go home. My dad is trying his hardest to help me, and most days we are thinking about our family back home. I am always thinking about them. I want to get home because they are not young any more.”

Gerald and Marie Taylor, Kevin’s parents, have been supporting him throughout his five-year ordeal but are almost at breaking point.

“We are really down in the dumps because this is prolonging the agony all the time,” said Gerald. “I spoke to him on Sunday, and he is doing the best he can at the moment. The problem is it never seems to get any better. The hearing date has still not transpired. We keep waiting for the court hearing but nothing happens.

“Again we are sitting here hoping there is a chance it will be this week. If we do not hear anything by Thursday, that will be it, another date will have passed. They can pick him up at any time without warning.”