London Fields trial collapses after jurors leave for ‘personal reasons’
The trial of a former public schoolboy accused of conning the taxman of £700,000 owed on his successful microbrewery has collapsed after three jurors pulled out.
Julian De Vere Whiteway-Wilkinson, 44, created the London Fields Brewery in Hackney in 2011, and ran it with his wife, 39-year-old Rosemary Spence.
The business proved a hit as the craze for craft beer took off, and it’s products – with names like ‘Make Love Not War’ or ‘Shoreditch Triangle’ – were sold all over London.
But between its inception in 2011 up until 1 December 2014 when the company was raided by Her Majesty’s Revenue in Customs, the brewery allegedly failed to pay a penny in VAT.
Deductions included in their workers’ pay packets such as income tax, national insurance and student loan repayments were also just retained by the company, Wood Green Crown Court heard.
They also allegedly failed to pay income tax on their own salaries.
Their trial was halted today (weds) after three members of the jury were forced to leave the panel for personal reasons.
Whiteway-Wilkinson and Spence will now face a new trial on a date yet to be fixed.
The couple, both of (2) Ayrsome Road, Hackney, deny three counts of cheating the public revenue and one of being knowingly concerned in the fraudulent evasion of income tax between 2011 and 2014.
ENDS
