LONDON, England: A British court has sentenced two men to long jail terms for operating a £70m money laundering scheme, which included £10m which came from fraudulent Covid loans.
Artem Terzyan, 38, from Russia, and Deivis Grochiatskij, 44, from Lithuania, were sentenced at Kingston Crown Court.
Police believe the Covid loan fraud was one of the largest to have been discovered since the 2020 plan was introduced.
Officials, however, said the police have only recovered £17,000, since most of the money was sent abroad.
The two men were first arrested in 2018 during a money laundering investigation.
Police reported witnessing large bags of cash being carried into the men’s London flats.
Officials said both men, along with other members of their organization, opened bank accounts under the names of various falsified companies.
The money was then repeatedly transferred from one false company to another, before being sent to banks in Germany, the Czech Republic, the U.A.E, Hong Kong, and Singapore.
Testimony noted that when the two suspects were out on bail after their 2018 arrest, the men applied for, and received, Covid business loans in 2020 for the various shell companies they had set up.
By repeatedly applying for £50,000 in assistance, they eventually received £10m in total.
High Court judge Rajeev Shetty ruled that the Covid business assistance played a part in “undermining the government and financial institutions” and that “the British taxpayer will be staggered and upset that part of their hard-earned tax contributions was going into the pockets of criminals.”
Terzyan was sentenced to 17 years in prison and Grochiatskij to 16 years.
Andy Tickner, from the National Crime Agency’s Organised Crime Partnership, said, “These men and their network played a vital role in enabling other criminals to conceal and access their illicit earnings.
“The removal of this service will have been a massive blow to organised criminals in the UK and globally,” as quoted by the BBC.
