Court / Man admits stealing £166k through VAT fraud
A BUSINESSMAN who fraudulently stole £166,000 from HMRC by submitting fake invoices and bank statements has been warned he must provide a clear plan to repay the money – or face jail.
Robert Roberts, from Cunningsburgh, admitted submitting doctored papers to HMRC, and claiming personal purchases were for his businesses, over a period of almost two years.
Roberts “manipulated the VAT system” to fraudulently obtain a total of £166,388.30 of taxpayer’s money during this time.
He did so by “falsely inflating” the value of some items for VAT purposes, reclaiming personal purchases as business expenses, and putting other purchases which had zero VAT through at 20 per cent VAT before claiming the money back.
To do this, Roberts used Adobe computer software to take “template” invoices and bank statements and falsely doctor them before submitting them to HMRC.
His returns raised suspicions with HRMC, and during an email exchange with them he submitted more false documents.
This was flagged up with their fraud investigation team, who confirmed that a “significant number of transactions” had been processed by Roberts fraudulently.
After being arrested and presented with the fake documents, Roberts made a full admission.
The 43-year-old made a total of 58 fraudulent transactions between 30 June 2020 and 14 June 2022, with £146,000 obtained from HMRC through 32 fake purchases to seven different companies.
The court heard the claims were made through two companies – one company trading as R. Roberts, and another RSM Fishing or RM Fishing Ltd, where Roberts was a director.
Roberts admitted in being concerned in the fraudulent evasion of VAT amounting to a total of £176,388.30, through submitting VAT returns to HMRC that he knew contained false information.
A total of £10,000 was withheld by HMRC, the court was told.
Defence agent Matthew Berlow asked Roberts to be bailed, pending the outcome of background reports.
Roberts had proposed a plan to pay the money back to HMRC, which was “quite far down the line” towards being agreed, Berlow said.
He said the businessman had purchased plots of land which homes were being built on.
Roberts anticipated being able to pay back the £166,000 in full within two years, Berlow said, once those homes were completed.
Sheriff Ian Cruickshank warned Roberts he would be “scrutinising in very careful detail” any plan to pay the money back, and the “feasibility” of whether it would work.
“Otherwise you will advise Mr Roberts of the possible consequences,” he told Berlow.
Sentencing on Roberts was deferred for a criminal justice social work report. He will return for sentencing next month.
Become a member of Shetland News
Shetland News is asking its readers to consider paying for membership to get additional perks:
- Removal of third-party ads;
- Bookmark posts to read later;
- Exclusive curated weekly newsletter;
- Hide membership messages;
- Comments open for discussion.
If you appreciate what we do and feel strongly about impartial local journalism, then please become a member of Shetland News by either making a single payment, or setting up a monthly, quarterly or yearly subscription.
Already a member? Sign in to hide this message.
