Jersey Unreported Judgments

[2007]JRC120

ROYAL COURT

(Samedi Division)

18^th June 2007

Before     :

Sir Geoffrey Nice, Esq., Commissioner and Jurats Le Brocq, Le Breton, Allo, Newcombe and Liddiard.

The Attorney General

-v-

Peter Wilson Michel

Simone Anne Gallichan

Sentencing by the Superior Number of the Royal Court, following conviction by the Inferior Number on 10^th May, 2007, on charges of:

Peter Wilson Michel

First Indictment

1 count of:

Assisting another to retain the benefit of criminal conduct, contrary to Article 32 (1) (a) of the Proceeds of Crime (Jersey) Law 1999.  (Count 1).

Second Indictment

9 counts of:

Assisting another to retain the benefit of criminal conduct, contrary to Article 32 (1) (a) of the Proceeds of Crime (Jersey) Law 1999.  (Counts 1 - 9).

Mr Michel was convicted on all counts.  The indictment was severed so that two trials of both accused took place.

Age:  60.

Plea: Not Guilty.

Details of Offence:

Peter Michel was a chartered accountant who used his business to hide stolen funds/funds chargeable to tax and pass the proceeds back to the malefactors.  He did this to the extent of many millions of pounds.  His methodology involved lies to the authorities, false invoicing and forgery.  Mrs Gallichan was found to have committed the offence in the case of one client, where the sum of over £1m was involved.

Details of Mitigation:

Peter Michel had no significant previous convictions recorded against him; he had suffered poor health, as had one of his children from an extra-marital relationship; he had not intended knowingly to launder money; he had not been conscious of acting beyond the prevailing practices of others. 

Previous Convictions:

None of significance.

Conclusions:

First Indictment

Starting point 10 years' imprisonment.

Count 1:

9 years' imprisonment.

Second Indictment

Starting point 10 years' imprisonment.

Conclusions:

Count 1:	9 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 2:	9 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 3:	9 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 4:	9 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 5:	9 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 6:	9 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 7:	9 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 8:	9 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 9:	9 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Total:	9 years' imprisonment.

A confiscation hearing against Mr Michel took place in September 2007.

Sentence and Observations of Court:

First Indictment

Starting point: 8 years' imprisonment.

Count 1:

6 years' imprisonment.

Second Indictment

Starting point: 8 years' imprisonment.

Count 1:	6 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 2:	6 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 3:	6 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 4:	6 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 5:	6 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 6:	6 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 7:	6 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 8:	6 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Count 9:	6 years' imprisonment, concurrent.
Total:	6 years' imprisonment.

Following the September confiscation hearing a confiscation order of £9.7 million was made against Mr Michel with a three year prison term in default.

Simone Anne Gallichan

First Indictment

1 count of:

Assisting another to retain the benefit of criminal conduct, contrary to Article 32 (1) (a) of the Proceeds of Crime (Jersey) Law 1999.  (Count 1).

Mrs Gallichan was convicted on one count.  The indictment was severed so that two trials of both accused took place.

Age:  58.

Plea: Not Guilty.

Details of Offence:

See Michel above.

Details of Mitigation:

Mrs Gallichan was of good character and was very much junior to her boss, Mr Michel, although having been responsible for some forgeries.

Previous Convictions:

None of significance.

Conclusions:

First Indictment

Starting point 4 years' imprisonment.

Count 1:

2 years' suspended for 2 years.

Sentence and Observations of Court:

First Indictment

Count 1:

120 hours Community Service Order.

 

C. E. Whelan, Esq., Crown Advocate.

Advocate D. E. Le Quesne.

Advocate C. M. Fogarty.

JUDGMENT

THE commissioner:

1.        These are serious cases.  Offences were committed as the law in Jersey was known to be changing, and within the offices of Peter Michel offences were being committed of a kind that was specifically being outlawed.  Various methods were employed for the commission of these crimes, frequently allowing but brief encounters between the clients engaged in criminal conduct and Peter Michel.

2.        Often enough negotiations were little more than a nod or a wink from a person within the group of people Peter Michel was prepared to help, but in a "no questions asked" environment.  Where on occasions, as in the Bhandal case, more active steps were required by Peter Michel, he was prepared to take those extra steps.  I say no more in detail about any of the counts on the indictment, they have been adequately described in the presentations by prosecution and defence counsel today and are well known through the records of the trial.

3.        The investigation into these offences took some six years.  That is no mitigation in itself when resistance to the allegations, by both defendants, may be thought to have contributed to that period of time being as long as it was.  It is a factor to take into account that 10% of each of the lives of these two defendants have been lived already in the shadow of these crimes and of the investigation into them.

4.        So far as you, Peter Michel, are concerned, you are ruined, it is manifest that you have been physically affected, there is a history of ill health that you have suffered.  If all the assets identified are in due course stripped from you then you will leave prison with no assets, and although that is irrelevant to the issue of sentencing today it is worth observing that that is a bleak landscape into which you will rejoin free society.  You are a man of ability and indeed charm and you have produced some good and impressive references including some from respectable colleagues within your profession.  But, due to the extent that these crimes represented a significant part of your business, you have emptied your professional life of professional value in order to serve the base interests of those, often already rich, who were looking for the pleasure of more pocket money.

5.        That you enjoyed, and were good at, teaching in the past highlights how, through greed, you chose to make nothing of yourself in this period of your life when you could have made much.  We have taken account of all the regular mitigation offered in this case but observe that there is also (not available to the public) further mitigation, the circumstances of which are so unusual or so unprecedented as to merit a moderate act of mercy additional to the effect that the other mitigation would itself already achieve.  We exercise that mercy within the Jurats overall duty to impose the proper sentence as they have determined that sentence to be, according to the authorities in so far as they are authorities drawn to their attention and the arguments that have been addressed.

6.        So far as you are concerned the sentences imposed are all concurrent and are the same for each of the 10 counts on these two indictments.  The learned Jurats are unanimous in all particulars.  The starting point for this offence is 8 years reduced by ordinary matters of mitigation to 7 years, but by the additional and particular mitigation mentioned above, described as an act of mercy, to 6 years' imprisonment, concurrent, on each of these counts on the indictment.

7.        I turn to Mrs Gallichan, in dealing with you for the one count that is against you all Jurats have put out of mind the acquittal in the second trial.  You are to be sentenced on the basis of the conviction, bearing in mind that in that trial it may be that you failed to discharge the burden that it was open to you to attempt to discharge under the Statute, an approach that was as it happens different from the approach taken in the other trial that has no significance in itself. 

8.        There is a great deal going to your credit.  You co-operated and answered questions and the Jurats have formed a strong view on the limitations of your understanding of the financial matters in which you were engaged, the environment in which you had no training, the fact that you made no financial gain, yourself, appeared to have taken no holidays and arguably were not only leant on but heavily used by Peter Michel. 

9.        We do not take the view that the offence for which you have been convicted merits a prison sentence.  As to disposal the Jurats are unanimous, subject to your expression of consent, as to the appropriate way of dealing with you.  That is that you should be dealt with by a Community Service Order, by a majority the hours of that Community Service Order is 120.

No Authorities