A FORMER country club owner and golf course director is in prison for his part in a £37.5million tax evasion fraud it can be revealed.

Peter Pomfrett, 56, of Woolston Manor Cottage, in Abridge Road, Chigwell, was sentenced to ten years' imprisonment in January 2008, but reporting restrictions on his case have only just been lifted.

Pomfrett was a well-known businessman in the Epping Forest District as the owner of the Epping Forest Country Club and director at Woolston Manor Golf Club.

Unconnected with those legitimate business positions, Pomfrett was at the heart of a 21-strong gang who conspired to import and sell on computer processing units (CPUs) as part of an elaborate tax scam.

The gang would import CPUs, mainly from Ireland, VAT free, and then sell them on cheaply through a chain of fraudulent companies but with VAT added.

They would finally claim a VAT credit back from Revenue and Customs for the VAT paid on the purchase of the goods.

Profits were divided among a number of gang members who would launder the money, believed to total £37.5million through various bank accounts.

Some of the money is believed to have been invested in a third of a tonne of gold bullion, substantial property in Dubai and a luxury flat near Harrods.

During the scam, Pomfrett was a director of Globalactive Tecnologies Ltd and acted as a broker sending goods back to different EU member states, exporting at a zero VAT rate and reclaiming the VAT charged.

He was sentenced to ten years' imprisonment for conspiracy to cheat the public revenue although this has since been reduced to eight years' on appeal. He was also disqualified from holding a company directorship for 14 years.

Among the other gang members were Martin Watmough, 57, of Arrowsmith Road, Chigwell,who was sentenced to nine months' imprisonment for laundering £105,000, and Leslie Pummell, 53, of Foremark Close, Hainault, who was sentenced to nine months' imprisonment for laundering £106,000.

In total the gang were jailed for 74 years.

The case was one of the most complicated ever fought by Revenue and Customs and totalled seven trials and retrials, the last of which only finished yesterday (May 25) enabling the full story to be told.

Custom's assistant director Adrian Farley said: “This was not some kind of victimless crime, but organised fraud on a massive scale by criminals masquerading as legitimate businesses all bent on making fast and easy profits at the expense of the British taxpayer.”

Confiscation proceedings to reclaim the proceeds of the crime are now being pursued.