BEING IN JAIL.. IT’S LIKE I’VE WON THE LOTTERY
£850K Fraudster Brags about Cushy Life Con’s golf trips and lunches on day release
A convicted tax fraudster has boasted of enjoying golf trips and country walks – just months after she was jailed for almost four years.
Donna Mackay is having so much fun that she compared being jailed to winning the Lottery.
Mackay, 44, and her ex-husband Michael Howard, 45, were convicted of an £850,000 tax scam while running their business.
But the brazen crook has bragged on Facebook of visiting her idyllic Highland home on day release.
Mackay also wrote about going out for meals and enjoying long walks in the countryside with partner Lesley.
She wrote: “Feels like I’ve won the
lotto. Home visits now, every two weeks for four days then it goes to seven nights home, seven nights as a guest of Her Majesty.”
Mackay was sentenced to three years and nine months behind bars while her former partner was given a three-year term for his role in the scheme in March.
She has since started a relationship with another woman, Lesley, and spends her jail time in a house in the grounds of HMP Cornton Vale, near Stirling.
Yesterday, Lesley posted that she was “eating lunch with Donna Mackay at The Courthouse Cafe Dornoch”.
She cracked a joke about Jail – a luxury shopping outlet: “While in Dornoch, Donna says it would be rude not to come here and visit The Jail.”
Mackay has used social media to share pictures of golfing trips with her new partner, who is a member of the PGA.
A keen golfer herself, prior to being jailed Mackay was snapped on the world famous Swilcan Bridge as she played a round at the Old Course in St Andrews. She labelled it a “fantastic experience” on Facebook at the time. She said of her round, back in 2013: “Best day ever. Legs like jelly trying to make contact with the ball.”
Since her imprisonment, golf has featured heavily in Mackay’s day release jaunts.
She has attended a BMW prizegiving at Brora Golf Club near her home, been on golf outings, been out for several meals and long countryside walks with friends and family, and has also attended a community gala day.
Mackay also shared details of her life at Cornton Vale, where she is studying for a psychology degree and told how she is given daily access to the city.
In a series of posts, she wrote: “I’m in the houses outside Cornton Vale they are lovely.
“Out and about in Stirling every day, oh and I start back doing my second year of my degree on September 1.
“It’s ironically been a great experience, the girls are all lovely – some sad stories. I’ve made some fantastic friends. Had great support from all the family and friends so that makes it so much easier.
“Miss Lesley and the Highlands so much but we’re stronger for going through this – can’t keep good women down.
“Counting the days and appreciating every moment home.”
Mackay and Howard previously ran security systems firm MDH Ltd from their £400,000 home in Motherwell and spent thousands of pounds on globetrotting and cars before investigators uncovered their wrongdoing.
Mackay failed to pay £531,400.01 in VAT, £150,892.61 in income tax and £162,731.47 in National Insurance between February 2010 and December 2013.
Her ex was only convicted on the VAT charge.
They flew on luxury trips to the Cayman Islands, Mexico and stayed in the plush Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas.
They had two expensive Range Rovers and bought a top-of-the range Aston Martin, which brazen Howard called his “weekend car”.
Their home boasted a sauna, gym,
private bar, games room, a garden clubhouse, six bathrooms and 13 flat-screen televisions.
In March, Sheriff Vincent Smith told the pair: “Depriving the public purse of taxes due is a very serious offence and must be dealt with severely.”
Both Mackay and Howard appeared back in court earlier this week for a proceeds of crime hearing as prosecutors try to recoup as much from the pair’s fraud as possible.
A spokesman for the Scottish Prison Service said they did not comment on individual prisoners.
Tory MSP Margaret Mitchell said: “This woman’s trial would have cost the taxpayer an absolute fortune but people may have felt there was some justice at the end of it.
“But now we see she is enjoying all the privileges of freedom and using social media to let everyone know about it.
“There should be an inquiry into this immediately as the public will want to see why in this case it appears that crime does pay.”