Jersey Unreported Judgments

ROYAL COURT

Samedi Division

19 January 1998

Before: FC Hamon, Esq., Deputy Bailiff, and

Jurats Myles, Gruchy, Le Ruez, Vibert, Herbert, Rumfitt,

Potter, de Veulle, Quéree, Le Brocq, and Tibbo

AG

-v-

David John Stilwell

Sentencing by the Superior Number of the Royal Court, to which the accused was remanded by the Inferior Number on the 19 December, 1997, following a guilty plea to:

13 counts of fraudulent conversion of property ( Count 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12, and 13).

Age: 38

Details of Offence:

Over a 5 year period the defendant fraudulently converted £1.3million of clients funds while acting as a self-employed trust and company administrator. Eventual deficit amounted to some £844,000. The money was used to fund successive purchases of family homes, and to pay for living and business expenses. A significant proportion of the money was lost in a fraudulent Nigerian "get rich-quick" scheme into which the defendant had been drawn.

Details of Mitigation:

Good character; offences arose originally from incompetence and lack of organisation; martial difficulties leading to excessive drinking /nervous breakdown; conscientious and successful effort to rehabilitate himself since arrest; assistance to investigators; plea of guilty particularly valuable in factually complex case of this sort. The Nigerian involvement had represented a desperate attempt to recoup the earlier losses.

Previous Convictions:

Motoring. Disregarded for present purposes.

Conclusions:

5 years imprisonment on each count, concurrent

Sentence and Observations of the Court:

Conclusions granted.

Mitigation given its full weight but had properly to be balanced against the seriousness of the breach of trust and the need to preserve Jerseys reputation for financial integrity.

C E Whelan, Esq., Crown Advocate

Advocate J D Melia for the accused

JUDGMENT

THE DEPUTY BAILIFF: The 13 counts of fraudulent conversion to which Stilwell has pleaded guilty show that between March, 1990, and July 1995, Stilwell fraudulently converted some £1,354,784 of money entrusted to him, and this to his own use or benefit.

We have had a very detailed analysis put to us by the Crown Advocate, Mr Whelan, of the way each indictment is founded, but even then the learned Crown Advocate presents only a summary of the key features. Some of the aggravating features of these offences are the blatant breach of trust within the Islands financial sector; the ignoring of regulatory contracts; and the shambles that has evolved out of his creating a monster that he could not possibly control.

There are some £844,000 of monies still outstanding and the investigation of Deloitte Touche shows that over the 5 years in question Stilwell converted some £1.3million of clients money to his own use or benefit or to that of his companies.

We say ‘to his own use or benefit’ because funds were used for such diverse purposes as to purchase property, the settlement of his personal bills, and investment in an extraordinary Nigerian scam, whose only basic motivation was greed.

Stilwell used a pattern which he himself described under caution, as "robbing Peter to pay Paul" so that when a trust fund that he administered required him to purchase a property in England he used the funds of other clients to make up the short-fall. Indeed on count 12, Stillwell took £4,000 in cash from a company after the criminal investigations had begun and when he had been warned specifically by the police in the strongest terms to suspend all dealings in the matter.

We must, of course, see what mitigation there is; he has, as best he can, co-operated following his arrest and, in the light of the complexities of the case, his guilty plea is of material value. We have read today some excellent references, and these are matters that the Court needs to take into account to establish a fair sentence. We need to balance the reputation and integrity of the financial sector in this Island on the one hand, while, on the other to have a determination not to be dazzled by the total sum involved.

The investigating work has been enormous and hugely difficult and no doubt these offences have not helped the reputation of the Island’s finance industry, but, as we have said, the plea of guilty is very valuable; it has saved considerable time. Miss Melia has said all she could possibly have said in mitigation; she has told us how Stilwell is now working - and has worked - manually, and as she said he now fully appreciates the value of money having had to work for it the hard way.

For two and a half years, while the investigations continued, he has been awaiting a decision of this Court; he has expressed deep remorse and his guilty plea, as we have said, has saved a lengthy and complex trial; his family life has suffered very greatly. But these are sadly matters with which we can have some sympathy but they cannot be regarded as exceptional.

We have had very close regard to the cases of Delaney (13 May 1993) Jersey Unreported and Hanley (14 October 1993) Jersey Unreported but after the most careful consideration this Court can only confirm the learned Crown Advocates conclusions which we do not find are excessive or inappropriate, and therefore, Stilwell, you are sentenced to 5 years imprisonment.

Authorities

Whelan: Aspects of Sentencing in the Superior Courts of Jersey: pp. 76 - 81

Ibid: Noter Up May 1995 - May, 1996: pp. 24 - 25