Rita Lomas: Woman who promoted £21m pyramid scheme ordered to pay back £1
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Version 0 of 1. A woman who promoted a £21 million get-rich-quick pyramid scheme that fleeced at least 10,000 victims has been ordered to pay back just £1. Rita Lomas, 50, encouraged people to join the Give and Take (G&T) scheme, which spread across the country between May 2008 and April 2009. Lomas, of Whitchurch, Bristol, previously received a four-and-a-half month suspended sentence after admitting she promoted the scheme. Thousands of people invested £3,000 into the scheme, which was run by a committee of women, in the promise they would receive £23,000 back. Victims were encouraged to “beg, borrow or steal” to invest in the scam, which organisers promised they “could not lose”. Committee members behind the scheme pocketed up to £92,000 each, while as many as 88% of their victims lost between £3,000 and £15,000. Eleven women, now aged between 35 and 70, became the first in the UK to be prosecuted for such a scheme, under legislation from the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Act 2008. Six of the group were convicted of operating and promoting the scheme, while Lomas and two others were convicted of promoting it. Bristol Crown Court today heard Lomas' benefit from G&T was agreed at £40,455.93 but her “realisable assets” were just £1. Judge Mark Horton told Lomas: “By agreement, I assess the benefit that you had from your criminal conduct at £40,455.93. “It is agreed between the parties that your realisable assets amount for the purposes of this amount to £1. “I therefore order confiscation in the order of £1 and £1 only. “I allow you 28 days by which to pay that. If you do fail to pay it, there is a period of seven days in default. “The implications of this order mean that if you do acquire sums of money it may well be that you are called upon to pay the whole or any part of the agreed benefit.” The court previously heard G&T destroyed friendships, families and communities as it swept from Bristol and Bath to areas of the UK including London, Yorkshire and Wales. “The scheme was directed at ordinary members of the public who were encouraged to beg, borrow or steal to get on to the scheme where they could not lose,” Judge Horton previously said. None of the women involved showed remorse for their offending, the judge added. The scheme operated on pyramid charts with 15 spaces - each filled with a participant who paid £3,000 and introduced two friends who also paid that amount. Once the chart was filled, the eight people on the bottom of the chart paid their £3,000 to the person at the top, called the “Bride”. Payouts were collected at champagne parties, where “Brides” were asked four questions before being handed £24,000 on a silver platter. A set £1,000 fee from the payout was deducted, with £600 shared between charities and £400 used to pay committee costs. Charts co-ordinator Mary Nash, 65, and committee secretary Susan Crane, 69, both of Broadleas, Bristol, were jailed for six months in October 2014 after admitting operating and promoting the scheme. Games co-ordinator Hazel Cameron, 55, of Chew Stoke, was handed a six-month sentence suspended for two years after admitting the same charges. In 2012, Sally Phillips, 35, of Hengrove, Jane Smith, 51, of Bishopsworth, both Bristol, and Lomas, admitted promoting the scheme. Phillips received a three-month suspended prison sentence, Smith a four-month suspended sentence and Lomas a four-and-a-half month suspended sentence. Following a five-month trial in 2012, chairman Laura Fox, 69, treasurer Jennifer Smith-Hayes, 69, and venue organiser Carol Chalmers, were convicted of operating and promoting the scheme. Fox, of East Harptree, Smith-Hayes, of Bishopsworth, and Chalmers, of Weston-super-Mare, were sentenced to nine months' imprisonment. They have now served their sentences. No verdict was reached following two trials of Tracey Laurence, 60, of Bradley Stoke, while Rhalina Yuill, 34, of St George, Bristol, was acquitted of promoting the scheme at her second trial. A hearing, scheduled to last for eight days, continues to recover money from Fox, Smith-Hayes, Nash, Crane, Chalmers and Cameron. PA |