A crooked accountant who pocketed nearly £180,000 from a COVID-19 fraud has been jailed. Daniel Jee used the details of well-known organisations to make multiple claims over an 18-month period.
Jee, from Leamington Spa, submitted 49 false Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) and Self-Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS) claims from March 2020. He targeted clients of the Exeter-based firm where he worked.
The 32-year-old funneled the stolen cash into his own bank accounts, as reported by DevonLive. He fraudulently used the details of two elderly individuals and ten organisations, including Barnfield Theatre, Exeter Leukaemia Fund, and St Giles Animal Centre.
READ MORE: Coventry One Stop transformed into Morrisons Daily
He submitted claims for more than £230,000 and blew the £179,218 he received on drugs, debts and gambling. In October 2021, HMRC discovered details of an Exeter company were being used to commit fraud.
Jee admitted 12 counts of fraud and was jailed for three years and four months at Exeter Crown Court. Judge Stephen Climie said Jee was ‘extraordinarily bright’ and planned a sophisticated fraud.
A spokesman for HMRC said: “Daniel Jee should have known better than to try to cheat the system. He stole from the taxpayer at the height of a national crisis.
“Accountants hold a position of enormous trust, and this sentence should serve as a warning to the minority of dishonest professionals who wrongly believe they can use their knowledge to commit or facilitate tax crime. Anyone with information about suspected tax fraud can report it online.”
Sign up for our FREE daily newsletter here for all the latest news about Coventry.
Read more on Coventry Telegraph
