UK man jailed for 4 years after inventing 716 donors and filing 60 fake Gift Aid claims to fraudulently obtain £708,750, using the money to pay off mortgages and family debts | World News

A UK man has been jailed for four years and eight months after inventing hundreds of charitable donations to fraudulently claim £708,750 from the government through the Gift Aid scheme. Abdul Muttakin Robbani, 54, from Chelmsford, submitted 60 false claims through his organisation, RMI Club, naming 716 people as donors despite them never having made the contributions. According to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), many of those named had only completed online surveys for small payments and did not know the organisation. Robbani used the proceeds to pay off mortgages and personal and family debts.

How did Robbani use fake donors to claim £708,750 from the government

According to the CPS, Robbani’s false claims identified 716 individuals as donors who had supposedly contributed between £5,000 and £10,000 each to RMI Club. However, the people whose names appeared on the claims had not made any such donations. Many of them had simply completed an online survey in return for a small payment and did not know RMI Club.Robbani told HMRC that the individuals had been recruited through a marketing survey called the ‘Sigma Social Impact Programme’. The programme was linked to a cryptocurrency mining scheme called ‘XO’, which he had created. The claims presented the survey participants as people who had made substantial charitable contributions, although they had not donated the amounts recorded in the submissions.

Why did HMRC investigate bank accounts with balances of just £1

To make the fraudulent donations appear legitimate, Robbani moved money between bank accounts under his control, using the names of the supposed donors as payment references. The transactions were designed to create the impression that RMI Club had received large donations from multiple individuals.HMRC’s banking analysis found that several of the accounts involved had balances of just £1 before the fraud took place. Investigators also examined the cryptocurrency scheme associated with the claims. A cryptocurrency expert commissioned during the investigation concluded that Robbani’s XO token had no objective value.

How did HMRC uncover Robbani’s £708,750 fraudulent donation claims

The investigation began in June 2021 when HMRC’s compliance team identified concerns about the claims. The matter was subsequently referred to HMRC’s Fraud Investigation Service, which interviewed a sample of the people named as donors and obtained banking records to establish how the money had moved.HMRC also secured an account freezing order and recovered £215,000 through forfeiture. A further £485,750 was traced to Robbani’s personal bank account. The CPS confirmed that confiscation proceedings under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 are ongoing to recover the proceeds of the criminal activity.

What did the CPS reveal about Robbani’s use of public money

The money obtained through the scheme was used to settle significant personal and family debts. Robbani used the proceeds to pay off mortgages on two properties in Chelmsford and Ipswich. Both properties were subsequently transferred into his wife’s name.Emma Beazley, a specialist prosecutor at the CPS’s Serious Economic Organised Crime and International Directorate, said: “Gift Aid exists to boost the vital work of charities and sports clubs – Robbani cynically exploited that system for personal gain, pocketing hundreds of thousands of pounds of public money that should never have been his.”She added that Robbani had gone to considerable lengths to conceal the fraud by falsely listing hundreds of innocent people as donors and creating a series of circular bank transactions to disguise his actions.

What penalties did Robbani face for his £708,750 Gift Aid fraud

Alongside his four-year-and-eight-month prison sentence, Robbani was disqualified from acting as a company director for 15 years. The court also imposed a Serious Crime Prevention Order lasting five years, which will begin after his release from prison.The CPS said that Robbani had previous convictions for deception and forgery dating back to the 1990s. In 2011, the Charity Commission also removed a charity chaired by him from its register following serious governance failures.Steve Doyle, Assistant Director at HMRC’s Fraud Investigation Service, said: “Robbani stole money that was meant to support genuine charities and instead used it to pay off mortgages and debts.”He added that tax fraud has consequences for public services and encouraged anyone with information about tax fraud or money laundering to report it through GOV.UK.Gift Aid is a government scheme that allows eligible charities and Community Amateur Sports Clubs to reclaim tax on donations made by UK taxpayers. The scheme increases the value of eligible donations by 25%. In Robbani’s case, the CPS said the system was exploited through fabricated donor details and misleading financial transactions, resulting in hundreds of thousands of pounds being paid out from public funds.