A company director who pocketed cash from his own business using a £1 million fraudulent pension scheme has been jailed.

Darren Say, of Kestrel Road, Waltham Abbey, was sentenced to six years behind bars at Chelmsford Crown Court today (Thursday, August 17) for a fraud he perpetrated between 2010 and 2016.

Say invented a pension scheme where he loaned money to investors for their self-invested pensions.

Those loans, together with tax relief, were invested with a property company that he was also the director of.

Rather than grow these funds for the benefit of his clients’ pensions, he pocketed the money and spent it on his lifestyle.

Chelmsford Crown Court heard Say used money for his rent, shopping, credit card repayments and cash withdrawals.

At the height of the scheme, he was responsible for more than £1million in his company accounts.

By the time he was arrested in January 2016, all the money had gone. This rendered the company useless and unable to raise any other development finance.

He was later arrested and charged with fraud by abuse of position and fraudulent trading.

He denied the charges but was convicted by a jury on Thursday, July 20 following a trial that began on June 12.

Detective Inspector Lee Morton, of the Kent and Essex Serious Crime Directorate, said: “Darren Say used the mechanism of the pension scheme he developed as his personal cash cow; taking money he was responsible for to fund his lifestyle.

“He has let down his clients, who were persuaded that his pension scheme would provide for them in retirement.

“Now they are faced with that time being lost and having to look for alternative arrangements to provide for them in later life.

“Company directors have great responsibility and should carry out their role with integrity and honesty.

“This case should enforce those responsibilities to other directors who might be tempted to act dishonestly.”

He was also sentenced to two years for fraudulent trading, which will run concurrently with his fraud sentence, and was disqualified from being a company director for eight years.

Essex Police will seek to recoup the cash Say took under the Proceeds of Crime Act legislation.