Company boss in £150k fraud to pay for wife’s IVF
A FINANCE company boss who stole more than £150,000 to fund IVF treatment has been jailed for three years.
Adrian Galliers, 50, turned to crime after struggling to start a family with his wife Carol for more than ten years.
Now father to twin four-year-old boys, the huge expense of IVF led Galliers to commit the ‘ wholly despicable’ fraud, Guernsey Royal Court was told.
He abused his position as director of his firm Guernsey Financial Consultants Ltd over four years – systematically defrauding clients who trusted him as a friend.
Will Giles, prosecuting, said one victim had known him for 20 years, adding: ‘Three were long- term friends who trusted him implicitly.’
Sam Maindonald, defending, said the crimes were out of character and her client could not explain why he had done it.
She said he had started to suffer from depression and was unable to motivate himself at work, but this had been coupled with the cost of paying for the treatment.
She said: ‘The couple were involved in expensive IVF treatment having failed to have children for ten years.
‘The offences were carried out over a four-and-a-half-year period.
‘The money was used to fund IVF treatment. He always intended to pay the money back but it spiralled out of control.’
Galliers had been supported by his family and had paid £28,000 back before his arrest, the court heard.
Advocate Maindonald said he had accepted that his life would now change. While he acknowledged this was due to his own stupidity, his wife and children would have to cope on their own until his release from prison. The family have since moved to Ireland.
Galliers was a director and sole signatory to a number of Retirement Annuity Trust Schemes, the court heard. He fraudulently transferred £157,150 from the funds.
Some £136,550 was deposited into his account and the rest taken from one fund to help pay off part of what he owed to another.
Police arrested him in October last year and under interview he confessed to moving the cash. Galliers, of Guernsey, admitted ten counts of abusing his position as a trustee from April 2010 to November 2014. Judge Russell Finch, sentencing, told him his crimes were ‘wholly despicable’.
He said: ‘This is no excuse for this type of activity. In effect, you stole their retirement monies.
‘We will do all we can to ensure your victims are repaid.’
A confiscation hearing will take place in June to discuss how to compensate Galliers’ defrauded clients.