Wedding venue accountant guilty of VAT fraud

The accountant for a well-known restaurant and wedding venue has been convicted of plotting a VAT fraud with the company's former owner.

Robert Brook, 47, who was employed by Casa Brighouse in West Yorkshire, was found guilty on 4 July of conspiracy to evade VAT and cheating the public revenue after a trial at Leeds Crown Court.

He will be sentenced on 5 September alongside ex-owner Jack McDaid, 67, who admitted the same charges on 9 June.

McDaid's business partner Samuel Revy-Holmes, 35, who also faced the same charges, was discharged after being found not guilty on both counts.

During the trial, jurors heard the business's turnover had been almost £10m during the period when the alleged offences took place between October 2011 and June 2018.

However, from November 2013 until May 2018, a total of 19 VAT returns were submitted which all showed no sales had taken place and no goods had been purchased, meaning no VAT was due.

At that time, McDaid, of Sandal Magna, Halifax, owned Casa Events, the venue's parent company.

Brook, of Orchid Grove, Netherton, was director of Yorkshire Accountancy Services and worked as the accountant for Casa Events.

The court heard the offences came to light when HM Revenue and Customs began investigating another of McDaid's companies, Castelite Developments, in September 2017.

That investigation got under way after no VAT returns were made for the business despite it being registered for about three years, jurors were told.

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