RAMZAN, APPEAL AGAINST CONVICTION AND SENTENCE BY, AGAINST HER MAJESTY'S ADVOCATE

Appellant: Duguid QC, MC MacKenzie; Faculty Appeals Unit (for Bell Brodie, Forfar)

Introduction [1] On 14 December 2012, after a trial which heard the testimony of 57 witnesses over 46 days in the High Court at Edinburgh, the appellant was convicted of five charges in connection with fraudulent schemes designed to generate repayments of Value Added Tax, when none was due.

[5] The Crown’s position was that the trading of the appellant libelled in the charges, which was primarily in mobile phones, was fraudulent. It was designed solely to create a VAT credit in the hands of the exporting company at the end of the chain, which would require to be paid by HMRC. Each intra UK transaction was simply a paper exercise, having no underlying commercial rationale or sense. The appellant’s contrary position at trial ( ibid ) was that he was a genuine, if naïve, trader who believed that he was conducting a lawful business.

[6] On 11 January 2013, a cumulo sentence of five years imprisonment was imposed in respect of the MTIC fraud charges (1), (3) and (4). Concurrent sentences of one and nine years imprisonment respectively were imposed on the money laundering charges (2) and (5).

[8] Ground 3 is that the trial judge erred in directing the jury that there was sufficient evidence in law to convict on each charge. This was refused leave to appeal at first sift. An application to re‒instate this ground under section 107(8) of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995 was also refused. A proposed amendment to add a ground 5, which purported to raise a compatibility issue, was refused at first sift and not pursued further. This left for consideration the appellant’s contention in ground 2 that the judge had misdirected the jury by: