From
October 2, 2005
It was an unwise venture for the professor.
In 1993 Nathan was convicted of stealing £135,000 from clients and was jailed for one year — an offence the Law Society described as the “tip of a large iceberg” when it struck him off.
Three further prison sentences for dishonesty and deception were to follow, including a £1.5m fraud on Coutts bank. The serial fraudster was disqualified from acting as a director but this did not seem to matter.
Leaving prison three years ago he adopted his middle name Stephen and began using a series of false birth dates as his own. He used this identity to set himself up as a director of his new company, Pure Energy. This was a criminal offence.
His fellow director Rees was not the only other company man with a criminal record.
One of Pure Energy’s two accountants, Barry Beardall, had also served six years in jail for Vat fraud after being caught attempting to smuggle £7m of alcohol into Britain.
None of these criminal records was disclosed to the banks or potential investors as Pure Energy sought cash. This included a £50,000 overdraft from Barclays Bank, acquired using Nathan’s false identity.
Nathan continued to woo investors, claiming that the company had interests in a potential wind farm site at Nigg in the Moray Firth. But the plans to create 35 wind turbines were just a pipe dream, according to a former senior employee.
Cheques to Fells bounced and several directors left as the creditors started circling. Nathan and Rees fled the company’s Heathrow offices without paying their rent. They set up another company, Pure Electricity, using a box number address and invited Fells to become a director. He accepted.
The Sunday Times was alerted to the relationship between the government adviser and the fraudsters after being approached by creditors. Among the documents shown to the newspaper was a driving licence in Nathan’s false identity which gave his address as Latchmere House. It is an open prison in Ham, Surrey.
Last week an undercover reporter from The Sunday Times approached Fells to see whether he would vouch for the company to investors. Fells was quick to point out how lucrative the business could be as there were large grants available for wind farms: “It will be £1 billion a year by 2010 . . . In fact, in five years you will probably see investments being paid off and a handsome profit being made.”
He volunteered that his role for the Pure companies was to “get involved when they need some technical advice or when they need a minister talking to or somebody like that, which I can do without any difficulty”.
He boasted of his contacts with ministers including Alan Johnson, the trade and industry minister, and Malcolm Wicks, the energy minister. It was this that prompted our reporter to inquire whether he would arrange meetings on our behalf.
Fells has now opened himself up to allegations of conflict of interest by representing paid clients and, at the same time, acting as a government adviser who should give untainted advice.
Nathan and Rees this weekend face a police inquiry.
On Friday Fells issued a statement through his lawyers saying that he was “appalled” to learn through The Sunday Times about his fellow directors’ criminal past and that he is resigning from the company immediately.
Rees said that the company had been operating legitimately and nobody had been defrauded. Nathan initially denied being the same man as his fraudster alter-ego. Later the company’s solicitor admitted that they were the same person.
In 1993 Nathan was convicted of stealing £135,000 from clients and was jailed for one year — an offence the Law Society described as the “tip of a large iceberg” when it struck him off.
Three further prison sentences for dishonesty and deception were to follow, including a £1.5m fraud on Coutts bank. The serial fraudster was disqualified from acting as a director but this did not seem to matter.
Leaving prison three years ago he adopted his middle name Stephen and began using a series of false birth dates as his own. He used this identity to set himself up as a director of his new company, Pure Energy. This was a criminal offence.
His fellow director Rees was not the only other company man with a criminal record.
One of Pure Energy’s two accountants, Barry Beardall, had also served six years in jail for Vat fraud after being caught attempting to smuggle £7m of alcohol into Britain.
None of these criminal records was disclosed to the banks or potential investors as Pure Energy sought cash. This included a £50,000 overdraft from Barclays Bank, acquired using Nathan’s false identity.
Nathan continued to woo investors, claiming that the company had interests in a potential wind farm site at Nigg in the Moray Firth. But the plans to create 35 wind turbines were just a pipe dream, according to a former senior employee.
Cheques to Fells bounced and several directors left as the creditors started circling. Nathan and Rees fled the company’s Heathrow offices without paying their rent. They set up another company, Pure Electricity, using a box number address and invited Fells to become a director. He accepted.
The Sunday Times was alerted to the relationship between the government adviser and the fraudsters after being approached by creditors. Among the documents shown to the newspaper was a driving licence in Nathan’s false identity which gave his address as Latchmere House. It is an open prison in Ham, Surrey.
Last week an undercover reporter from The Sunday Times approached Fells to see whether he would vouch for the company to investors. Fells was quick to point out how lucrative the business could be as there were large grants available for wind farms: “It will be £1 billion a year by 2010 . . . In fact, in five years you will probably see investments being paid off and a handsome profit being made.”
He volunteered that his role for the Pure companies was to “get involved when they need some technical advice or when they need a minister talking to or somebody like that, which I can do without any difficulty”.
He boasted of his contacts with ministers including Alan Johnson, the trade and industry minister, and Malcolm Wicks, the energy minister. It was this that prompted our reporter to inquire whether he would arrange meetings on our behalf.
Fells has now opened himself up to allegations of conflict of interest by representing paid clients and, at the same time, acting as a government adviser who should give untainted advice.
Nathan and Rees this weekend face a police inquiry.
On Friday Fells issued a statement through his lawyers saying that he was “appalled” to learn through The Sunday Times about his fellow directors’ criminal past and that he is resigning from the company immediately.
Rees said that the company had been operating legitimately and nobody had been defrauded. Nathan initially denied being the same man as his fraudster alter-ego. Later the company’s solicitor admitted that they were the same person.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article573783.ece?token=null&offset=12&page=2
