Courtesy of the EADT
18 October 2012 |
Mother-of-five masterminded £7.5m
luxury car fraud in Bugattis, Ferraris and Maseratis from her 14th-century
moated mansion
Note:- The fraud
figures seems to vary up to £9.3m if you take into consideration
her additional HMRC fraud.
" Kankamol Albon, 41, lived in a £4m 14th-century
mansion with ten bedrooms
" Jailed for six years after it turned out her life was built
on pyramid scheme
" She talked victims into handing over huge sums of money for
prestige cars
" Many customers never received them from mother-of-five, known
as 'Minky'
To her wealthy clients and friends,
she was a successful and charming businesswoman.
Kankamol Albon's skill at convincing people to buy luxury cars allowed
her to live in a £4million, 14th-century mansion with ten
bedrooms and a moat, take expensive holidays and send her five children
to private schools.
But her lavish lifestyle turned out to be built on a pyramid scheme
in which she defrauded investors of £7.5million. She has now
been jailed for six years.
Albon, 41, known to her friends as 'Minky', talked her victims into
handing over huge sums of money to buy prestige cars including Ferraris
and Bentleys, but many customers never received them.
In one deal, she sold the same vehicle to two different people,
Ipswich Crown Court heard on Wednesday.
She complicated Ponzi scheme saw Albon use money from new customers
to pay off her most disgruntled creditors. Some people took out
loans of hundreds of thousands of pounds on the promise of huge
returns.
A few lost their homes, cars and businesses.
Even while on bail after her arrest, she tried to fleece HM Revenue
and Customs of £1.8million by pretending to sell cars abroad
and claiming back VAT on the deals.
Albon was sentenced after admitting charges of false representation
and cheating the public revenue in what Judge Rupert Overbury called
a 'massive', 'greed-driven' fraud.
He told Albon: 'You persistently defrauded investors who were told
that you were able to buy and sell high-value motor vehicles, such
as Bugattis, Ferraris, Rolls-Royces and Maseratis, which you claimed
could be immediately sold for profit and would be available for
the personal use of investors.
The majority of investors never saw a car.
'You persistently defrauded investors who were told that you were
able to buy and sell high-value motor vehicles, such as Bugattis,
Ferraris, Rolls-Royces and Maseratis' said
Judge Rupert Overbury
'They were persuaded to roll over so-called profits you were making
so you could maintain the illusion you were running a profitable
business.'
Albon, who was raised in Thailand and came to Britain 28 years ago,
started working as a bookkeeper in 1993 at NA Carriage Company,
which was in the name of her now estranged husband Nigel, 55, a
former racing driver.
She took over the company in 2004 and the court heard that it made
vast sums.
At one point, she withdrew £580,000 and spent it on her home,
Smallbridge Hall, in Bures, near Sudbury, Suffolk, where she ran
the business and lived with her three daughters and two sons.
Courtesy of the Daily Mail
By Andrew Levy
PUBLISHED: 15:27, 18 October 2012 | UPDATED: 7 November 2012
|
Albon arriving at Ipswich Crown Court