Three jailed for €22m Swiss bank fraud
From Tax & Regulation Jan 30 2012 BY: Will Jackson
, Contributing editor
, International Adviser
Three British men have been jailed for defrauding Swiss private bank EFG of €22m ($29m).
According to the Serious Fraud Office (SFO), Kevin James Christopher Steele, Michael Andrew Shephard and Mark Terence Pattinson made a €22m loan application to EFG, supported by a false claim that more than £76m ($119m) was held on deposit at a Guernsey bank as security.
Steele, a partner at London-based law firm Mishcon de Reya, together with Shephard, one of his clients, and Pattinson, an associate of Shephard’s, conspired to forge letters purporting to be from Bank Julius Baer & Co in Guernsey, the SFO said.
The false documents were then presented to EFG, in order to support the loan application on behalf of Shephard. The claimed purpose of the loan was for property developments in Turkey.
An SFO investigation which started in November 2008, in conjunction with the Warwickshire Constabulary, led to charges being brought against all three conspirators in June 2009.
Shephard and Pattinson pleaded guilty ahead of trial, to conspiring to use false instruments and commit fraud by false representation. Steele denied the charges against him but was convicted of the same offences on 5 Dec, 2011.
Steele was additionally found guilty of fraud contrary to section 1 of the Fraud Act 2006, in that he exposed Mishcon de Reya to risk of loss, thereby abusing his position as a partner in a law firm. He was sentenced to five years and six months’ imprisonment.
Shephard was jailed for six years and three months, and disqualified from acting as a company director for 15 years. Pattinson, who gave evidence at the trial of Steele, was imprisoned for 18 months.
In passing the sentences, HHJ Wood QC said that Steele had been “lured” into the crime by Shephard’s “dominating nature”. Of Shephard, the judge added: “You derived some pathetic satisfaction from parading yourself as a man of wealth.”