A PENSIONER has been jailed for two years and six months for the part he played in a £2.6 million VAT fraud.

At Leeds Crown Court Peter Baddeley, aged 71, of Sandpiper Close, Farnworth, was convicted of money laundering for a gang and sentenced by Judge Neil Clark.

Baddeley's son, Andrew Baddeley, aged 45, from Church Lawton, Stoke-on Trent previously admitted VAT fraud and money laundering and has been jailed for four years and six months.

Douglas Brown, aged 55, from Springfield Avenue, Warrington, was convicted of the same charges and has been sent to prison for four years and one month.

Andrew Baddeley and Brown both ran IT recycling businesses but the court heard they used their company accounts to launder money for a criminal gang. Twenty three of its members were jailed in 2016.

An investigation by HM Revenue and Customs found the Baddeleys and Brown moved £420,774 of criminal cash though their accounts.

Andrew Baddeley and Brown also claimed they had repaired computer monitors before selling them to customers in Africa, but the investigation revealed it was a scam.

They claimed to have spent £1 million buying the monitors from two IT recycling companies before re-selling to Africa.

They then reclaimed the VAT they supposedly paid on the goods, but checks revealed the purchases were fake and the men had created a string of phoney paperwork.

Andrew Baddeley ran CMS Computer Monitor Services Ltd in Radway Green, Crewe, claiming £94,746 in fraudulent VAT repayments as well as laundering £409,819 of the gang's money between October 2009 and August 2011.

His father, Peter Baddeley, ran the business until December 2010 and was convicted of money laundering between October 2009 and May 2011.

Brown ran Recycle Technology Ltd in Warrington, claiming £99,787 in fraudulent VAT repayments and laundered £10,955 of criminal money in 2010.

The criminal gang which gave the Baddeleys and Brown money to launder was based in the West Midlands, Nottinghamshire and West Yorkshire.

It used 20 fake companies to make over 80 fraudulent VAT repayment claims totalling £2.6 million in a highly sophisticated fraud.

Its members were jailed for more than 54 years in 2016 in total after a four-year investigation by HMRC.

Proceedings to recover the stolen VAT and criminal proceeds are now underway. Andrew Baddeley has also been banned from acting as a company director for six years, his father, Peter Baddeley, for three years and Brown for six years.