Four people were acquitted by a jury on Wednesday after a £266mn alleged money laundering trial — one of the biggest such prosecutions ever brought in the UK.
The jury at Leeds Crown Court on Wednesday found four defendants not guilty of one count of money laundering but on Wednesday said they were unable to reach verdicts on four other individuals — including socialite James Stunt, 40, of west London — who now face a retrial.
The long running criminal trial, which began in May, had centred around allegations by prosecutors that Fowler Oldfield, a Bradford gold dealership at the centre of an alleged £266mn money laundering operation used criminal cash from illicit activities deposited in its NatWest bank account to buy gold, which was then shipped to Dubai and out of the reach of the UK authorities. All eight defendants in the trial had denied one count of money laundering.
Francesca Sota, 34, Stunt’s former personal assistant, along with Stunt’s former employee Alex Tulloch, 41, and two former Fowler Oldfield employees — Paul Miller, 45, of Wetherby and accountant Heidi Buckler, 46, of Leeds — were all cleared by the jury at Leeds Crown Court on Wednesday of money laundering.
The jury were unable to reach verdicts on Stunt and on former Fowler Oldfield employees Gregory Frankel, 44, of Leeds and Daniel Rawson, 45, of Leeds, and Bradford jeweller Haroon Rashid, 51.
Stunt was also acquitted by the jury along with Sota of a separate charge of forgery.
The 11-strong jury, who had deliberated for almost 30 hours and who had sat through the eight month trial, were discharged on Wednesday afternoon by trial Judge Andrew Stubbs KC.
