HMRC did not forge warrant to seize mansion - judge

The judge said Bal Bhandal's case was "riddled with contradictions and inconsistencies"

A businessman has failed to prove HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) forged an arrest warrant that led to the seizure of his multimillion-pound mansion, a High Court judge has said.

Bal Bhandal was accused of using money laundered from the proceeds of tax evasion on alcohol sales to develop Updown Court in Surrey.

Estimated to be worth around £80m when it was seized in July 2001, the mansion was forcibly sold to a building society for more than £14m to pay off Mr Bhandal's outstanding mortgage.

Living in Los Angeles at the time, Mr Bhandal was jailed for a kidnapping offence after his return to the UK in 2005.

Prosecutors dropped charges of fraud against him when it emerged that a police informer had been involved in handing out false documents, which showed duty and tax had been paid on the alcohol when it had not.

Mr Bhandal later tried to claim the remaining £66m from HMRC at the High Court, but a judge ruled in 2015 that he was "satisfied beyond any reasonable doubt" that Mr Bhandal was guilty of the fraud.

During further legal action in February, Mr Bhandal claimed HMRC's predecessor, HM Customs and Excise, along with officer Stephen Broad, had forged the arrest warrant, which HMRC denied.

But Mr Justice Edwin Johnson dismissed the claim, finding that Mr Broad had gone to Uxbridge Magistrates' Court for the warrant despite there being no official record of him doing so.

In a judgment handed down on Wednesday, he described Mr Bhandal's case as being "riddled with contradictions and inconsistencies".

The judge disagreed with the claim that because there was no record of the warrant being issued in the court files, it therefore must not exist.

He suggested that it may not have been the court's practice or it could have happened through an administrative error.

The judge added: "The warrant was not a forgery. Neither was the information. Both are genuine.

"None of the alleged acts of fraud and forgery which constitute the forgery case took place."