U.K. Tax Adviser Gets 4 Years for $100-Million Charity Scam
October 25, 2012 | Read Time: 1 minute
The former head of a British accounting firm was sentenced Wednesday to four years in prison for a scheme that netted clients nearly $112-million in tax breaks for donating overvalued stocks to charity, the Financial Times’ s FT Adviser reports.
Regulators said Roy Faichney, as managing director of Vantis Tax Ltd., co-orchestrated a plot to get wealthy clients to buy shares in shell companies he and a deputy set up and listed on the Channel Islands Stock Exchange. The accountants used phony transactions to inflate the share values, greatly increasing the owners’ tax relief for donating the stock.
According to a statement from Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, the U.K. tax agency, Mr. Faichney and a deputy, David Perrin, personally made some $7.2-million from the fraud. Mr. Perrin was convicted in January for his role in the scheme.
