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A former company director has been disqualified after diverting thousands of pounds from an insurance settlement into his personal bank account, despite his business owing close to £800,000 to creditors.
Dean Jacobs, who was the sole director of L&H Construction, a specialist recruitment company which helped people in the mechanical and electrical industries find new work, was prosecuted after sending £60,000 from an insurance settlement into his own personal account.
The 29-year-old from Birmingham was handed a 10-year ban from directly or indirectly becoming involved, without the permission of the court, in the promotion, formation or management of a company.
After trading for a little over two-and-a-half years, L&H ran into difficulties and entered into administration on 04 January 2017, after HMRC presented a winding up petition for an outstanding tax bill. Upon administration, the company owed creditors close to £800,000.
Insolvency practitioners were brought in to deal with the administration but Mr Jacobs failed to cooperate with their investigations.
Administrators were then made aware that L&H was awarded an insurance settlement and when asked where the money had gone, Mr Jacobs could not provide any explanation of what he did with the funds.
Further investigations found that despite being fully aware that L&H had stopped trading and owed money to creditors, Mr Jacobs diverted the £60,000 settlement straight into his personal bank account.
Susan MacLeod, Chief Investigator of Insolvent Investigations, Midlands & West at the Insolvency Service, said: "Dean Jacobs put his own interests ahead of the company’s creditors and the timing of the funds he took from the insurance settlement showed a cynical disregard to those creditors.
"Directors who put their own personal financial interest above those of creditors damage business confidence. We will take action against directors who do not take their duties seriously and abuse their position and they will therefore lose the privilege of limited liability trading."
(LM/MH)
