SFO secures first-ever UWO to investigate a £1.5m Lake District property linked to a £100m fraud.

17 January 2025:- the SFO has secured its first-ever Unexplained Wealth Order to investigate a £1.5m Lake District property linked to a £100m fraud.

• The property is owned by CLAIRE SCHOOLS, the ex-wife of jailed solicitor Timothy SCHOOLS, and is suspected of having been bought with criminal proceeds (SEE ADDITIONAL NEWS BELOW).
• A High Court freezing order secured today ensures that any money from the house sale is secured while SFO investigates its funding.
• Ms Schools has also been ordered to produce information within 28 days about how the property was obtained.
• The SFO may use this information to bring a case to seize the house later.
• The SFO is the second law enforcement authority to employ this tool. We remain committed to using new methods to combat fraud and recover illicit assets.

13 January 2025 = Timothy Schools, told to repay £1m from fraud or face more years in jail

The struck-off solicitor Timothy Schools, WHO WAS jailed for 14 years for the AXIOM LEGAL FINANCING FUND FRAUD,

• Has been ordered to pay back £1.1m or face five years in jail.
• The Proceeds of Crime Act hearing at Southwark Crown Court heard that the fraud led by Timothy Schools, 65, was worth around £146m when inflation was added to the £105m that was lost.

AXIOM LEGAL FINANCING FUND FRAUD

• AXIOM The Cayman Islands-based fund – which lent money to law firms to pay for disbursements, mainly for personal injury cases – closed in October 2012 after four years in the wake of allegations of fraud and went into receivership in February 2013 owing investors around £120m.
• Mr Schools was struck off in 2014, although the charges did not relate to the Axiom fund – which has no connection with the most recent alleged fraud at Axiom Ince.
• More than 500 investors poured cash into the fund. Mr Schools received nearly £20m from it, using some of it to pay for an estate in Cumbria.
• He also had a £45,000 corporate box at Blackpool FC’s home ground, claiming it was a business expense for corporate hospitality.
• He owned Preston firm ATM Solicitors, given its name because he used it as “his cash machine”, his 2022 trial heard. He claimed it was a “cashpoint” for clients to conduct their litigation and receive compensation.
• Axiom’s marketing material claimed investors’ cash would be held in the Cayman Islands and forwarded to an ‘independent panel’ of law firms that would pay it back with 15% interest.
• However, Mr Schools only loaned money to a few firms and mainly went to firms Mr Schools was involved with.

TRIAL AND CONVICTION

• Describing him as an “utterly dishonest man”, Judge Martin Beddoe sentenced him to eight years in prison for fraudulent trading and a further six for fraud itself, making a total of 14, following a five-month trial.
• He was convicted of two further offences of fraudulent trading, which resulted in additional sentences of seven and eight years, running concurrently with the first two.
• His appeal against sentence was rejected in 2023, while last year, David Kennedy, an investment manager at the heart of the fraud, was jailed for eight years for fraudulent trading.
• Paul Raudnitz KC, prosecuting, told the court last week that the £1.1m would be available to compensate Axiom investors.
• The Serious Fraud Office continued its investigation into Mr Schools’ assets.

READ MORE HERE:

• https://ow.ly/uTsi50UIss4
• https://www.gov.uk/government/news/sfo-secures-first-unexplained-wealth-order-in-100m-fraud-case
• https://www.legalfutures.co.uk/latest-news/ex-solicitor-told-to-repay-1m-from-fraud-or-face-more-years-in-jail