A company director named on HMRC's 'most wanted' tax fugitive list has been extradited from the US and jailed for four and a half years for his part in a £22m tax fraud.
Jonathan Nugent, a former computer dealer, was a director of Clear Technology Ltd based in Cheshire. In 1998 he was charged with a £5.5m VAT fraud following an investigation by Customs and Excise officers (now HMRC), but absconded to the US in 2000 before his trial began.
Last year HMRC named Nugent as one of its most wanted fraudsters still on the run and he was tracked down to California by the HMRC fugitive unit with the help of the US authorities.
Nugent was originally arrested after investigators found he had used his company to help others smuggle goods from Hong Kong and Eire into the UK between 1994 and 1998. This allowed the gang to evade UK customs duty on importation, and VAT on sales in the UK.
HMRC said Nugent played a key role as he introduced the smuggled goods into his company records by using false invoices, which were then used to support false VAT declarations, resulting in the evasion of approximately £5.5m.
Nugent laundered the profits from the fraud by either making large cash withdrawals or organising transfers to false business accounts set up by his co-conspirators. The money was eventually transferred into accounts in Hong Kong and Switzerland in the names of the main conspirators, including Nugent - who also used the alias Newgent in the fraud.
As a result of his recapture and arrest in 2012, Nugent pleaded guilty at Manchester Crown Court and was sentenced to 4 years 6 months in jail. Other gang members involved in the smuggling and money laundering were jailed for over 16 years in 2001.
