Fraudster ordered to pay back £308,000

Terry Thackrah, 59, was jailed for six years in April 2010 after Leeds Crown Court heard he set up the scam while working as a client relief manager for Royal Bank of Scotland subsidiaries.

After working for nearly 25 years for Green Flag and Direct Line, he used his knowledge of the accounting system, to get commission due to others diverted into two bogus bank accounts which he had set up.

He retired in 2007 from his £37.000 a year job and subsequently moved with his new Thai bride to a four bedroom villa in Cyprus but was arrested in 2009 at Stansted Airport after he had paid a visit to Wakefield to visit relatives.

Police discovered money had continued going into the accounts even after his retirement, which was on top of the two pensions he was receiving.

He eventually admitted two charges of converting criminal property between February 2003 and September 2009.

The court heard his lavish lifestyle on the island included running a £50,000 Range Rover Sport with the personalised initials TJT. He also lavished gifts on his daughter and paid for her to have frequent trips abroad and to visit him.

Yesterday at the same court Judge Roger Ibbotson ruled Thackrah’s criminal benefit from his offending was £1,110, 495.36 and he made a confiscation order for £308,000 after being told that was now the available recoverable amount.

He gave Thackrah six months to pay and told him there would be a further three years three months in default if he failed to do so.

The court heard in 2010 that Thackrah started taking the money because he discovered it was “so simple” at a time when his personal life was in a mess.

The judge who jailed him said his breach of trust was “gross” and “obscene”.