A 73-year-old building surveyor, Roger Bryant, has been jailed for six and a half years for embezzling over £1m from the National Trust through submitting false invoices. His sons, James Bryant and Scott Bryant, were found guilty of two charges relating to “them knowing – or at least suspecting – the money generated from their own companies by their father was the proceeds of crime”. James Bryant was sentenced to four years in prison, while Scott Bryant received two years suspended for 18 months.
During the trial, the court heard that while employed as a building surveyor at the National Trust, Roger Bryant fraudulently invoiced the trust for work that was either partially or wholly unfinished by either JR Contracting or SB Construction. The National Trust believed that they had paid two companies for finished work. In total, between January 2008 and October 2013, the charity made 112 payments totalling £1,061,096.29. Payments were made to JR Contracting in most cases, and SB Construction in the rest. All payments were made to one of two bank accounts that were both owned by James Bryant.
The fraud was discovered by the National Trust in October 2013 during an update on its procurement approach. After the discovery of the fraudulent payments, Roger Bryant tried to pervert the course of justice by asking two people to lie, claiming they had witnessed works taking place at various locations when, in fact, they had not. Following the conviction, the National Trust stated it was pleased with the outcome.
Det Insp Adam Bond said this was a “complex case hindered by the passage of time”, and that the sentences passed by His Honour Judge Burgess KC reflect the severity of this fraud. Sian Mitchell from the Crown Prosecution Service added they intend to pursue confiscation proceedings against the defendants to remove any available funds from this fraud. The judge described Roger Bryant’s criminality as “audacious and protracted”, given that he had a position of considerable trust within the organisation and was responsible for a budget of over £0.5m per year. The judge added that Bryant actively abused his position, and his sons were consciously complicit in the crime
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