Bromley man jailed for being part of organised crime group pocketing £22m in unpaid taxes
A Bromley man who was part of an organised crime group that pocketed £22 million in unpaid taxes has been jailed. The seven men were caught as part of an investigation by Kent Police and HMRC when they were found to be setting up a series of labor comply companies keeping VAT payments that should have gone to HMRC for themselves.
Their elaborate plot was discovered when Phillip Bailey was arrested on suspicion of firearms, theft and money laundering offences in April 2020. As part of their enquiries, police looked into the 36-year-old’s finances and realised he was a criminal accountant.
Bailey, of Beechwood Gardens, Meopham, was found to have set up agreements with recruited construction and logistics companies. He set up front companies and bank accounts to divert tax payments away from HMRC. The companies and accounts were set up in the names of front directors, not his own.
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In turn he would pay off complicit company directors with a portion of the money he made from the scheme. Following Bailey’s arrest in 2020, Daniel Newton, 37, from Whitefriars Wharf in Tonbridge became the group’s criminal accountant and carried on its activities in Bailey’s absence.
Throughout this criminal scheme, 39-year-old Bradley Mortimer, of Chelsfield Lane, Orpington, allowed his bank account and others under his control to be used to launder of £2.1 million pounds. Money was transferred to the accounts and he withdrew it in cash before handing it back to the organised crime group.
Yesterday (Tuesday, February 4) at Southwark Crown Court he was sentenced to three and a half years in prison.
Others that benefited from the fraud included:
Sean Dean, 41 from London Road, Teynham who introduced a large electrical contractor to the OCG and received a 20 per cent cut of the stolen VAT. He also admitted arranging and conducting cash deliveries for the group.
Lee Hudson, 56, from Ordinance Way, Ashford who worked in the OCG’s offices for five years, ran the payroll and was aware that the “business” made its money by stealing the VAT and CIS payments. He received a large amount of cash every week in addition to his legitimate wage paid into his bank account.
Sarah Gillard, 41 from Beechwood Gardens, Meopham is the partner of Phillip Bailey and received over £300,000 from his bank accounts, despite him being in prison. All the money was traced back to the fraud and the group.
In addition to operating this large and sophisticated fraud, the investigation identified that the group was also running a profitable money laundering scheme for criminal associates. Over £2 million was identified as being linked to large scale drug supply network across the south east of the UK.
Leading the investigation was Detective Constable Dameon Shaw, he said: “These criminals set up and ran a large-scale operation designed to steal VAT and CIS payments, which were then paid out to themselves and criminal associates. They are now paying the price for their actions with the sentences handed out by the court today.
“Tax fraud is not a victimless crime; the public rely on the revenue generated by tax to fund essential services. No matter how hard they tried to conceal their illicit gains, our expert investigators were able to unravel their web of lies.”
Ian Hackett, Operational Lead, in HMRC’s Fraud Investigation Service, said: “We have worked closely with Kent Police to dismantle this sophisticated and complex fraud.‘The tenacity and expertise of the investigators involved in this joint investigation has protected millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money, which is needed to fund our public services. We encourage anyone with information about any type of tax fraud to report it to HMRC online.”
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