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Agencies & People

Property lettings boss sentenced after breaking director disqualification order

Former lettings firm chief Nicholas Constable given lenient sentence after fall from grace and technical nature of breach revealed in court.

Nigel Lewis

insolvency lettings firm

The former boss of a Surrey lettings company banned from being a company director for eight years after his firm went bust owing nearly £7 million has been sentenced to unpaid community work after breaching the terms of his original banning order.

63-year-old Nicholas Constable was given a disqualification order four years ago after failing to ensure his company Xenex Developments dealt with its rental income in the correct manner or held adequate accounting records.

The original disqualification banned him from directly or indirectly becoming involved in the ‘promotion, formation or management of a company for the duration of the term’.

During an investigation by The Insolvency Service into the collapse of the Weybridge-based lettings and development company, it was found that Constable had diverted rental income worth nearly £900,000 into his personal bank account and that of a connected company.

Breach

During a court hearing in Guildford, Constable was found guilty of a technical breach of his disqualification order after he admitted that between 2017 and 2019 he had been a member of a LLP media company unrelated to the property industry which themselves are being investigated by HMRC.

Constable is now a registered bankrupt and working in the property management industry ‘on a modest salary,’ his legal representative told the Guildford court.

Given these mitigating circumstances, the presiding magistrate said she accepted the disqualification breaches were not ‘malicious’ and sentenced Constable to a community order including 180 hours of unpaid work. He must pay court costs and a surcharge of £2,585.

Read more about insolvencies.

July 26, 2021

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