Jailed, the tax-dodging trawlerman who netted £½m...but paid nothing
A FISHERMAN who earned almost £500,000 in five years and paid no tax has been jailed for 15 months.
Alan Hunter appeared for sentencing at Inverness Sheriff Court yesterday after he previously admitted defrauding HMRC of £90,000 in revenue between 2012 and 2017.
Hunter, 51, was originally charged with a higher sum of £124,000, from 2010. The selfemployed fisherman, of Fochabers, Moray, had failed to submit any self-assessments, fiscal depute Robert Weir told the court.
Jailing him, Sheriff Ian Cruickshank said: ‘This is an extremely serious charge of dishonesty over a five-year period. You failed to declare £425,000 of earnings and failed to pay £90,000 in income tax.’
The sheriff said that although Hunter’s company had a tax savings scheme, he did not take advantage of it. ‘This was a wilful and deliberate act and there is no alternative to a custodial sentence,’ he added.
Mr Weir earlier told the court that Hunter was ‘a share fisherman working on the vessel Carina, and the Don Fishing Company paid Hunter his share of the profits for working on the boat’.
He said: ‘A share fisherman is not employed under a contract of service and gets paid by sharing the profits, and all should be registered as self-employed.
‘The company has their main office in Peterhead and provided HMRC with details of who crews their boats. It was discovered that Alan Hunter, although registered for selfassessment, had never actually declared earnings or paid tax or national insurance.’
Mr Weir added: ‘Over the years, HMRC has tried, with mixed success, to contact Hunter. In 2005, he advised
HMRC that he was living in Florida.’
Hunter’s solicitor, Keith Tuck, said his client had been offered a skipper’s job which would mean he could repay £30,000 a year.
But after hearing that Hunter faces a Proceeds of Crime order which would see any of his remaining assets confiscated, the sheriff chose to jail him immediately.
Mr Tuck said Hunter’s marriage had ended and the cash was spent on ‘providing a lifestyle’ for his second wife.
Hunter was caught in Operation Ode 17, an investigation into the suspected fraudulent evasion of income tax.