BAFTA nominated film producers jailed over tax scam

Two film producers who span a ‘web of lies’ to get taxpayers to finance a BAFTA nominated film attacking press ethics have been jailed.

Christopher Walsh Atkins, 40, and Christina Slater, 37, along with fellow producer Terence Potter, 55, took advantage of a government scheme to support home-grown films.

Atkins and Slater vastly inflated invoice costs to ensure they received investment for ‘Starsuckers’ – described as a ‘critique of the rise of the celebrity culture’.

They were today (FRI) jailed by Southwark Crown Court after being convicted on two counts of conspiracy to cheat the public revenue and one of fraud.

Former public schoolboy Atkins, who gave evidence to the Leveson Inquiry into press standards, made the documentary in 2009, which secretly sold fake stories about celebrities to tabloid newspapers.

Last year he wrote and directed “UKIP: The First 100 Days”, for Channel 4.

The controversial film, mixed real news archive with fly-on-the wall style footage of a fictional UKIP MP, and sparked more than 6,000 complaints to the broadcasting regulator Ofcom.

Potter, the brains behind Cardiff’s Aquarius Films – which holds distribution rights to George Clooney’s 1999 blockbuster ‘Three Kings’ – was jailed for eight years last December after he admitted his role in the scam.

Judge Martin Beddoe had previously adjourned sentencing the pair, partly to allow Slater to make arrangements for her two children.

Shane Collery, prosecuting, had earlier told the court the pair had allowed others to wrongly claim tax.

He said: ‘These defendants and others essentially created a web of lies to assist others not here to obtain tax relief to which they were not entitled.

‘They did this because this was the way they obtained funding for the film ventures they engaged in.

‘That came first, that was what mattered to them and it was more important than if the tax payer in this country effectively lost money.’

The pair inflated invoice costs to make it appear as though losses had been incurred by two Limited Liability Partnerships (LLPs) created by Potter, who was also a chartered accountant.

‘Investors in those LLPs could use those losses to reduce their tax bills,’ the prosecutor continued.

‘Potter in particular was the creator of a scheme that required that the two LLPs he formed, and indeed others, made losses.

‘This itself would then mean that investors in those LLPs could use those losses to reduce their tax bills.

‘Those investors provided the money that would be used in part to pay for the film Walsh Atkins and Slater produced and another project.

‘Without the involvement of Walsh Atkins and Slater it would not have worked.’

They used Film Tax Credit (FTC) to claim back inflated cash from the Treasury.

‘The Crown say that this film cost less than half of that which they represented to HMRC.

The disastrous government scheme known as ‘sideways relief’ was launched by the then Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown in his 1997 budget to promote the British film industry, allowing investors to claim back 40% of the company’s losses from their PAYE tax.

Dozens of fraudsters have exploited the scheme and Loose Women star Angela McLean was drawn into the making of one movie called’ A Landscape of Lies’ where she was to play bisexual therapist in a £20 million con.

Simon Pentol, mitigating for Atkins, said: ‘For the defendant this is a very sad day, and he faces no illusion.

‘We hope for a sentence that will not crush him, and will not be disproportionate.’

Rupert Pardoe, mitigating for Slater, said: ‘There is the clearest water between my clients and Mr Potter.

‘Formulating the plan with Mr Potter was not something she was party to.

‘They were motivated by a desire to make a film, there is no evidence of high living.’

Judge Beddoe jailed Slater for four years and Atkins for five years.

He said: ‘You put the vanity of your ambitions above all else to chase a kind of celebrity status.

‘You played an important part in Mr Potter’s scheme.

‘The second scheme had nothing to do with Mr Potter, it was only the two of you.

I’ve heard this was not for personal gain, and was to fund a film.

‘However, whether a yacht, a Picasso, a terrible piece of art or a film, it makes no difference.’

The pair were also disqualified from being company directors for 12 years.

Atkins, of Barrington Court, Gospel Oak, north London and Slater, of Copps Road Leamington Spa, Warwickshire, showed no trace of emotion as they were led to the cells.

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