Around the Islands: Jail for pair who conned Guernsey’s government out of millions

The ‘Lagan fraud’ saw Guernsey’s Treasury and Resources Department lose £2.6 million, which was transferred through bank accounts across the world.

Adrian Taylor (44), who was jailed for six years, admitted one charge of entering into a money-laundering arrangement and acquiring criminal property, and attempting to fool a bank into believing that he was a millionaire at Southwark Crown Court this week.

Co-accused John Woodhatch (58) was jailed for five years after he also admitted entering into a money laundering arrangement and transferring criminal property, both charges relating to the Guernsey scam.

At the time, Guernsey was in the process of building a new airport runway in a £56 million contract granted to the company Lagan Construction.

Prosecutor James Dawes told the court how the two men had seized on the multi-million-pound runway project as a target for their fraud.

The two fraudsters discovered that Treasury and Resources paid large sums of money to the company each month for its work, and that is when they became involved in the plot to defraud the Bailiwick of Guernsey out of £2.6 million.

Mr Dawes said: ‘In the middle of June 2012, a person pretending to be from Lagan Construction rang the Treasury Department to ask if they could change the bank details which the government held for them. The person who was in charge of security allowed the change to go through, and on 3 July 2012, £2,613,032 was deposited into the account in the name of Sports Currency Management Ltd.

After the transfer, Woodhatch was busy distributing the money as fast as he could out of his bank and into other accounts, some of which were in Istanbul and Abu Dhabi, and the money was never recovered.

The fraud was uncovered after Woodhatch failed to convince the Royal Bank of Scotland that cash funnelled through his accounts was for a racehorse in Dubai.

Taylor handed himself into the City of London Police after it was revealed that Woodhatch had transferred him £52,000.

Nick Renny conducts the auction for number plate 007 which sold for £240,000

A MAN really had a ‘licence to kill’ this week after he bought a James Bond registration plate for £240,000.

Cheers were heard in the Beau Séjour concourse in Guernsey this week when the 007 car registration was sold at a Martel Maides auction.

The price paid for the plate was between £15,000 and £20,000 higher than what it was predicted it would sell for. However, the successful bidder did not want to comment on his extravagant purchase.

Those who attended the auction, which saw 44 car registration numbers and 13 motorcycle numbers on offer, showed their support to the man who fought for the 007 plate and cheered when he was successful.

Number 08 went for £34,000, more than its initial estimation of between £20,000 and £30,000.

Guernsey’s Environment Department has been auctioning special registration marks for the past 15 years and in April 2011 the department announced that it would extend the range of special registration marks by the introduction of a new series of marks prefixed with 0 or 00.

The first auction of the extended range of prefixes was held in November 2011 and dozens have been auctioned since this date.

The department added that to date, several thousand pounds had been raised from the auctioning of ‘0’ and ’00’ registration plates.

‘The potential value of any particular mark can vary depending on its perceived uniqueness or particular interest or importance to an individual or individuals,’ it said.

Guernsey's Vale Mill was built in 1850. Picture: MARK GUILLE

AN iconic building in Guernsey will be converted into a dwelling after planning permission for change of use was granted.

Vale Mill, which was built in 1850, will be converted into a house, despite a number of concerns from islanders neighbouring the building.

The planning permission notice states that although four letters of representation from neighbours were received, detailing concerns of loss of privacy, the impact on birds and wildlife, additional noise and light pollution, among other concerns, the project was approved.

Deputy Roger Perrot, one of the men behind the project, said: ‘We are delighted that we have got change of use granted and we will continue to work towards doing something with this amazing building.’

The top two levels of the mill were added by the Germans during the Occupation, and on the walls, maps and points of interest are still visible. And the building gives unparalleled views of the north of the island.

However, these top two levels will not be occupied because of problems with access.

Planners said: ‘Matters of access and rights of way are legal matters which should be resolved through the appropriate channels. Therefore, the change of use to residential use is acceptable, in this case. However, there are some matters of detail which require to be resolved before construction begins. These relate to details of all windows and doors, internal staircases, internal joinery and the external balustrade to the staircase, including method of fixing.’

OFFICERS from the Guernsey Border Agency had to sift through 18 tonnes of paper in an attempt to find evidence of a money laundering operation.

Michael Doyle (47) was jailed for 7½ years by the island’s Royal Court this week and his wife Belinda Lanyon (54) was jailed for 3½ years for money laundering offences and for carrying out business within the Bailiwick without a licence for more than two years.

The couple were convicted in July at the end of a complex trial lasting for nearly four weeks.

Jurats were told that the pair had already pleaded guilty to carrying out an act intended to pervert the course of public justice.

In November 2012, both had disposed of an unknown quantity of documentary evidence in the Vazon recycling bins which they knew was of material relevance to the ongoing money-laundering investigation.

A total of 18 one-ton bales of recycling were searched at the island’s landfill site, Mont Cuet, to find the relevant documentation linking the two to the fraudulent activity.

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