F1 News
Bernie Ecclestone admits fraud
- Toby McLuskie
Bernie Ecclestone, the former Formula 1 boss, has admitted committing tax fraud. It involves a trust in Singapore with assets under management of £400 million (€462 million).
The outspoken British billionaire had previously failed to declare these assets to British tax authorities, the BBC reported. Ecclestone personally admitted the fraud when he was due to appear at Southwark Crown Court in London earlier today. Ecclestone literally said, "I plead guilty". This statement is a legal formality. With it, Ecclestone is avoiding a public trial scheduled for next month. Incidentally, this says nothing about a possible punishment for Bernie.
Global investigation
Ecclestone was charged following a tax investigation by Britain's tax inspectorate HM Revenues and Customs (HMRC), which said the investigation was "complex and worldwide". Prosecutors said Bernie declared "only a single trust" to the tax authorities, a trust set up on behalf of his daughter. He allegedly denied to the tax authorities that he had been involved in other trusts. But that turned out not to be true. After Ecclestone pleaded guilty in court, prosecutor Richard Wright said the suspect, Bernie, had knowingly given an "untrue or misleading" response to HMRC when he told them he had no further trust outside the UK.
Bernie has to pay
Wright made no bones about it: "Mr Ecclestone was not entirely clear on how ownership of the accounts in question were structured. Mr Ecclestone recognizes it was wrong to answer the questions he did because it ran the risk that HMRC would not continue to investigate his affairs." Ecclestone does not get away with it, and according to the prosecutor, he still has to pay taxes on the trust in Singapore: "He [Eccestone] now accepts that some tax is due in relation to these matters."
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