Jailed councillor told to repay £1m
A disgraced West Yorkshire councillor who was jailed for nine years for running a sophisticated visa scam has been ordered to pay back £1m under the Proceeds of Crime Act legislation.
It is understood that Khadam Hussain’s available assets include property in this country and Dubai as well as money.
A DISGRACED West Yorkshire councillor who was jailed for nine years for running a sophisticated visa scam has been ordered to pay back £1m under the Proceeds of Crime Act legislation.
It is understood that Khadam Hussain’s available assets include property in this country and Dubai as well as sums of money in bank accounts.
Hussain, who previously represented the City ward on Bradford Council for the Conservative Party – but was axed from the council for poor attendance while still claiming allowances – was described by a judge as the “originator and organiser” of the immigration fraud.
It is said to have involved the submission of more than 100 applications.
They were said to have been supported by a range of fake documentation from solicitors, estate agents and would-be employers.
The prosecution estimated that the conspiracy to defraud Home Office entry clearance officers could have earned Hussain up to £175,000.
Hussain himself claimed he had only gained about £60,000 from his fraud.
Hussain, of Box Tree Close, Bradford, his 53-year-old wife Zahida and their three sons Adam Ashraf, 36, Gibran Hussain, 26, and 31-year-old Adnan Hussain, had all been found guilty of conspiracy to defraud at the end of a trial at the city’s crown court in November 2014.
A fifth man Numan Shafi, 24, was also convicted of the same offence.
Ashraf, of Northcroft Rise, Bradford, was jailed for seven years and the same sentence was imposed on Gibran Hussain, of Box Tree Close, and Shafi, of Hilton Road, Bradford.
Adnan Hussain, also of Hilton Road, was jailed for seven years and three months after he also admitted benefit fraud offences.
Zahida Hussain was sentenced to two years in jail, suspended for two years.
Five of the defendants appeared before Judge David Hatton QC for the proceeds of crime hearing yesterday at Bradford Crown Court and he made various orders in relation to each of them.
Hussain, who is still serving his jail term, was said to have benefitted from criminal conduct to the tune of £1m.
He must meet the confiscation order in the same sum within three months or face a further seven years in jail.
Hussain’s wife was ordered to hand over £19,500.
Adnan and Gibran Hussain, who are also still serving their prison sentences, were made the subject of nominal £1 orders. Shafi, who is now out of prison, was told to pay back £2,305.15.
The complex fraud investigation, which involved the collection of about 10,000 pages of documentation, began after a solicitor complained that forged documents in her name had been used to support visa applications in 2011.
In September 2012 investigating officers carried out searches at an Islamic wedding venue in City Road, Bradford, known as “The Palace” and addresses linked to 62-year-old Hussain and the other defendants.
The prosecution had alleged that “The Palace” had essentially been a front for the family’s principal business which was offering immigration advice and documentation in return for payments of up to £3,000 a time.
This involved an assault on immigration procedures Judge Hatton sentencing the defendants at a court hearing in 2014.