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| Robert Faichney and David Perrin used Channel Islands-based companies to cheat the taxman, its is alleged. Photograph: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images |
Two former
Vantis accountants and ex-tax officials faked documents to siphon money out of
tax avoidance schemes marketed to well-known and wealthy individuals, a court
heard.
Robert
"Roy" Faichney and David Perrin, alongside their wives Shirley
Faichney and Nicola Perrin, manufactured a series of bogus documents to allow
the payment of huge sums from the companies involved in the scheme to a Jersey
trust, it was alleged.
The
prosecution argued that the trust did not exist, and that the money went
directly into Nicola Perrin's Jersey bank account. She then allegedly
distributed the cash equally to accounts held by the Perrins and the Faichneys.
The two families spent the money on holidays, properties in Norfolk, Edinburgh
and Jersey, and a Porsche Cayenne for a Vantis employee who had been involved
in setting up the tax avoidance scheme, it was alleged.
In total
the four extracted almost £5m, spending £2.75m, with £10,000 alleged to have
been spent by the Faichneys on their silver wedding celebrations.
The four
are charged with cheating the Revenue through the fake papertrail. The two men
have also been charged, alongside a business associate, over the tax schemes
themselves.
According
to the prosecution these schemes abused charity tax relief rules. Wealthy
individuals were encouraged to invest in four companies, which in turn bought
software rights. The companies were floated on the Channel Islands stock
exchange, and the price of the shares dishonestly ramped up, the prosecution
says, allowing high-income individuals to shelter their earnings from tax by
gifting the over-inflated shares.
The
defendants purported that a trust called the Richardson Trust was the original
owner of the intellectual property bought by the companies, the jury was told.
Prosecutors say an agreement was created retrospectively to show that the trust
was due as much as 90% of any consideration if the software rights were sold
on, allowing the four to extract further cash from the other companies
involved.
"The
effrontery of this almost beggars belief. It really is creating something out
of nothing. The word greed is highly appropriate," Philip Singer QC,
prosecuting, said.
The
prosecution said emails between Mrs Perrin and Mrs Faichney made it clear they
knew what was going on. In one email, Nicola Perrin fretted that "the bank
is going to ask lots of questions about this money,". Mrs Faichney is
alleged to have talked excitedly about how their husbands were "going to
do another one" soon after one big transfer of cash.
The court
had earlier heard how the tax schemes were allegedly marketed to individuals
who had an appetite for "jousting with the Revenue", in the words of
an internal Vantis document. Mr Perrin shared an email exchange with an
investor who had received a tax rebate. "Feels good, doesn't it?" Mr
Perrin is alleged to have written. "Lovely. Well done to you lot,"
the investor replied.
"Have
you any plans [for the cash]? Spend it on drink and loose women and then just
waste the rest?" Mr Perrin is alleged to have written in response.
All five
defendants deny the charges. The trial continues.
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