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6 years jail for garlic scam

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    #332
    wexie
    Closed Accounts Posts: 7,480 ✭✭✭wexie


    dvpower wrote: »
    He has just been convicted in a major case of tax evasion - his bad character has been established by a court.

    It has indeed :
    “It gives me no joy at all to jail a decent man," Judge Nolan said.
    He said Begley is a “success story” an “asset to the country” in supporting the economy and providing employment. He noted Begley’s generosity and that he donates money to homeless charities and the St Vincent de Paul.


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    #333
    dvpower
    Closed Accounts Posts: 9,183 ✭✭✭dvpower


    wexie wrote: »
    It has indeed :
    That from the judge that gave him 6 years - just underlines the seriousness of the crime.


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    #334
    steddyeddy
    Registered Users Posts: 27,564 ✭✭✭✭steddyeddy


    benway wrote: »
    Tell me how €1.6m defrauded in 4 years is small fry? Yet again, €250k dole fraud gets you 12 1/2 years. Nobody seemed to have any real problem with that.

    And even accepting that he's at the lower end of corporate corruption in this country, how are we going to catch the big fish if we can't even reel in the small fry?

    His appeal is going to be very interesting.

    I have a huge problem with the bit in bold. More so than this even. 1.6 millions is small fry compared to the larger tax fraudsters Ill bet. 1.6 million in garlic scamming is nothing compared to betie ahern not having a bank account, charlie haugheys robbery of taxpayers money and the dodgy bank deals.


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    #335
    BarackPyjama
    Closed Accounts Posts: 974 ✭✭✭BarackPyjama


    dvpower wrote: »
    He has just been convicted in a major case of tax evasion - his bad character has been established by a court.

    According to the court he's worse than a rapist or a murderer. I hope nobody you know ever gets raped or murdered and you don't have to live through the actual trauma of watching a judge pass down a Mickey Mouse sentence to the person who did it, while jailing a family man like Begley for twice as long for not paying a 230% import duty on vampire repellant. :rolleyes:


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    #336
    benway
    Registered Users Posts: 1,061 ✭✭✭benway


    BarackPyjama wrote: »
    Putting this father of three in jail for 6 years might seem like a nice bit of retribution for the Little Irelanders out there but it's actually going to cost the taxpayer yet more money. Remember - before he was jailed, he didn't cost the taxpayer a penny. Quite the opposite. His incarceration is going to cost more than his 'fraud'. And all because the government want their revenge.

    You still at it? Just cost the exchequer the €1.6m he scammed. Sure he's a daycent oul schkin, though, one of our own. Can't ye all lave him be?

    Personally, I think he's going to end up with two years suspended tops on appeal, following outcry from Little Irelanders bleating about the rapist who was given a medal and a cheque for €5,000 by this same judge, but sure isn't it a shame to treat a decent squire of the land like that, and brazen corporate apologists.

    And once this little charade has been played out, gombeen ireland will slink back off to business as usual, knowing that the public are that short-sighted that they'll never be held accountable.


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    #337
    BarackPyjama
    Closed Accounts Posts: 974 ✭✭✭BarackPyjama


    dvpower wrote: »
    That from the judge that gave him 6 years - just underlines the seriousness of the crime.

    Wow. Just wow. No wonder this country is in the state it's in. The majority of people living here can't even think for themselves.


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    #338
    Carawaystick
    Registered Users Posts: 8,779 ✭✭✭Carawaystick


    benway wrote: »
    No, they haven't. A life sentence is mandatory for murder.

    No it's not:
    http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/1998/0620/98062000040.html

    This sentence was suspended at a later hearing.


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    #339
    steddyeddy
    Registered Users Posts: 27,564 ✭✭✭✭steddyeddy


    benway wrote: »
    You still at it? Just cost the exchequer the €1.6m he scammed. Sure he's a daycent oul schkin, though, one of our own. Can't ye all lave him be?

    Personally, I think he's going to end up with two years suspended tops on appeal, following outcry from Little Irelanders bleating about the rapist who was given a medal and a cheque for €5,000 by this same judge, but sure isn't it a shame to treat a decent squire of the land like that, and brazen corporate apologists.

    And once this little charade has been played out, gombeen ireland will slink back off to business as usual, knowing that the public are that short-sighted that they'll never be held accountable.

    Ok lets change tact. Can you explain to me why the "justice" system maintains that this guy is worse than a peadophile?


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    #340
    BarackPyjama
    Closed Accounts Posts: 974 ✭✭✭BarackPyjama


    benway wrote: »
    You still at it? Just cost the exchequer the €1.6m he scammed.

    He didn't cost the taxpayer a penny. No money paid into Revenue coffers by the Irish taxpayer reached his or his company's bank account. In fact he was a massive contributor to the economy.
    benway wrote: »
    Personally, I think he's going to end up with two years suspended tops on appeal, following outcry from Little Irelanders bleating about the rapist who was given a medal and a cheque for €5,000 by this same judge, but sure isn't it a shame to treat a decent squire of the land like that, and brazen corporate apologists.

    'Corporate apologists'? WTF are you talking about? Should we abolish companies and go back to tilling the f**king fields?
    benway wrote: »
    And once this little charade has been played out, gombeen ireland will slink back off to business as usual, knowing that the public are that short-sighted that they'll never be held accountable.

    Held accountable for what? Ridiculous garlic import duty evasion? How about we start with the crooks (in banking and the government) who have bankrupted and destroyed this country for generations and work our way down instead? We should get to Mr Begley in, oooooh, maybe 50 years time.


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    #341
    steddyeddy
    Registered Users Posts: 27,564 ✭✭✭✭steddyeddy


    benway wrote: »
    You still at it? Just cost the exchequer the €1.6m he scammed. Sure he's a daycent oul schkin, though, one of our own. Can't ye all lave him be?

    Personally, I think he's going to end up with two years suspended tops on appeal, following outcry from Little Irelanders bleating about the rapist who was given a medal and a cheque for €5,000 by this same judge, but sure isn't it a shame to treat a decent squire of the land like that, and brazen corporate apologists.

    And once this little charade has been played out, gombeen ireland will slink back off to business as usual, knowing that the public are that short-sighted that they'll never be held accountable.

    Your right there. Dodgy deals have cost this country billions easily. Yet the public are short sighted enough to ignore the big fish and go for this guy. Haughey got a tribunal and this guy gets 6 years. The public are indeed short sighted.


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    #342
    Chucky the tree
    Closed Accounts Posts: 19,341 ✭✭✭✭Chucky the tree


    BarackPyjama wrote: »
    According to the court he's worse than a rapist or a murderer. I hope nobody you know ever gets raped or murdered and you don't have to live through the actual trauma of watching a judge pass down a Mickey Mouse sentence to the person who did it, while jailing a family man like Begley for twice as long for not paying a 230% import duty on vampire repellant. :rolleyes:



    He is? I didn't realise the court or even judge declared him worse than a rapist or murderer.


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    #343
    BarackPyjama
    Closed Accounts Posts: 974 ✭✭✭BarackPyjama


    steddyeddy wrote: »
    Your right there. Dodgy deals have cost this country billions easily. Yet the public are short sighted enough to ignore the big fish and go for this guy. Haughey got a tribunal and this guy gets 6 years. The public are indeed short sighted.

    Precisely my point. If the government can't practice what it preaches, it shouldn't expect anyone else to abide by it's rules - particularly the unfair and/or moronic ones.


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    #344
    steddyeddy
    Registered Users Posts: 27,564 ✭✭✭✭steddyeddy


    Chucky the tree wrote: »
    He is? I didn't realise the court or even judge declared him worse than a rapist or murderer.

    He handed him a harsher sentence than he did a peadophile. Actions speak louder than words.


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    #345
    BarackPyjama
    Closed Accounts Posts: 974 ✭✭✭BarackPyjama


    Chucky the tree wrote: »
    He is? I didn't realise the court or even judge declared him worse than a rapist or murderer.

    *sigh*

    I was responding to this:
    He has just been convicted in a major case of tax evasion - his bad character has been established by a court.

    Now he received twice the sentence as both a rapist and an OAP killer from the same judge. Going by the above assertion, he's worse.

    Get involved in the debate by all means but at least read the thread first. :rolleyes:


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    #346
    Chucky the tree
    Closed Accounts Posts: 19,341 ✭✭✭✭Chucky the tree


    BarackPyjama wrote: »
    *sigh*

    I was responding to this:



    Now he received twice the sentence as both a rapist and an OAP killer from the same judge. Going by the above assertion, he's worse.

    Get involved in the debate by all means but at least read the thread first. :rolleyes:


    He never got a longer sentence then someone convicted of murder. Maybe you are the one who needs to brush up on their reading?


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    #347
    ArmaniJeanss
    Registered Users Posts: 13,340 ✭✭✭✭ArmaniJeanss


    BarackPyjama wrote: »
    Held accountable for what? Ridiculous garlic import duty evasion? How about we start with the crooks (in banking and the government) who have bankrupted and destroyed this country for generations and work our way down instead? We should get to Mr Begley in, oooooh, maybe 50 years time.

    This is the equivalent of (motorist to gardai) 'Why are you stopping me for breaking a red light, shouldn't you be out there catching murderers?'.


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    #348
    benway
    Registered Users Posts: 1,061 ✭✭✭benway


    steddyeddy wrote: »
    Ok lets change tact. Can you explain to me why the "justice" system maintains that this guy is worse than a peadophile?

    It doesn't. Moral revulsion is only one of the criteria in sentencing, rehabilitation, general deterrence and other factors come into play. It's misleading, also, to hold up "a paedophile" in the abstract as a yardstick, without going into the specific facts of the case.

    @carawaystick

    Yes, it is.

    Section 2 of the Criminal Justice Act, 1990 provides that:-

    “A person convicted of treason or murder shall be sentenced to imprisonment for life.”


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    #349
    BarackPyjama
    Closed Accounts Posts: 974 ✭✭✭BarackPyjama


    ArmaniJeanss wrote: »
    This is the equivalent of (motorist to gardai) 'Why are you stopping me for breaking a red light, shouldn't you be out there catching murderers?'.

    I wouldn't know. I was driving around the city center today and counted about 20 clampers and not a single garda in sight.


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    #350
    BarackPyjama
    Closed Accounts Posts: 974 ✭✭✭BarackPyjama


    Chucky the tree wrote: »
    He never got a longer sentence then someone convicted of murder. Maybe you are the one who needs to brush up on their reading?

    Or battering an OAP to death. Whatever you want to call it. My point remains. :rolleyes:


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    #351
    benway
    Registered Users Posts: 1,061 ✭✭✭benway


    steddyeddy wrote: »
    Your right there. Dodgy deals have cost this country billions easily. Yet the public are short sighted enough to ignore the big fish and go for this guy. Haughey got a tribunal and this guy gets 6 years. The public are indeed short sighted.

    Well and good, but in my book, if you're excusing this guy, you're excusing the lot of them.


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    #352
    BarackPyjama
    Closed Accounts Posts: 974 ✭✭✭BarackPyjama


    benway wrote: »
    Well and good, but in my book, if you're excusing this guy, you're excusing the lot of them.

    No. This guy won't be excused. The bigger crooks will though. They're generally politically protected. Either way, you're getting f**ked along with nearly everyone else in the country. Enjoy. And do keep defending the same government that's doing it to you. It's hilarious. :)


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    #353
    Tayla
    Registered Users Posts: 2,158 ✭✭✭Tayla


    realies wrote: »
    If it was a different judge who passed the sentence would you have a problem with the jail term ?

    It would depend on his sentencing record.
    realies wrote: »
    What do you mean you would let them get away with it, do you think white collar crime is victimless,its only tax evasion sure that's all right then.


    No I said that I would let them all away with it if it meant that paedophiles got dealt with accordingly, not because I think white collar crime is victimless but because I think paedophiles should be locked up for a very long time and it would make this a better safer country.


    benway wrote: »

    Fck this guy. Let him rot. Fair play to the judge for having the courage to impose a harsh sentence on him - maybe this will make some of the other gombeens out there sit up and take notice.

    It's an awful pity he doesn't have this 'courage' when it comes to sentencing paedophiles.


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    #354
    steddyeddy
    Registered Users Posts: 27,564 ✭✭✭✭steddyeddy


    benway wrote: »
    Well and good, but in my book, if you're excusing this guy, you're excusing the lot of them.

    As I said im not excusing him. What he did was wrong. Im not saying he shouldnt have been caught or put on trial or sentenced. Im wondering why this country always punishes people on the small end of the fraud scale.


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    #355
    Chucky the tree
    Closed Accounts Posts: 19,341 ✭✭✭✭Chucky the tree


    BarackPyjama wrote: »
    Or battering an OAP to death. Whatever you want to call it. My point remains. :rolleyes:



    No it doesn't. Your point was incorrect, that still remains. I'd hardly call one punch battering either.


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    #356
    ArmaniJeanss
    Registered Users Posts: 13,340 ✭✭✭✭ArmaniJeanss


    Leaving aside everything else - one interesting overlooked point is that the customs first uncovered this in Oct 2007.

    Mr Begley appears to have been dumb enough to keep an email trail and various paperwork. He also, according to the prosecution, co-operated fully with the investigators.
    So by any definition he was low hanging fruit, a very easy conviction.

    Yet it took 4+ more years to actually build a case, get him to court and get a sentence passed.
    It serves to underline just how slow moving the system is, how painstaking the paperwork involved is, how thorough the state have to be when they bring a tax evasion case.

    Now for those who correctly want to see the less easy targets have their day in court I can only imagine how difficult it will be with the 'bankers' who didn't leave an email trail or damning paperwork and who decide not to co-operate the authorities. Who decide to bamboozle investigators with false trails, misinformation and plausible deniability.
    Don't hold your breath on these cases.


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    #357
    BarackPyjama
    Closed Accounts Posts: 974 ✭✭✭BarackPyjama


    steddyeddy wrote: »
    As I said im not excusing him. What he did was wrong. Im not saying he shouldnt have been caught or put on trial or sentenced. Im wondering why this country always punishes people on the small end of the fraud scale.

    Because it's considered a crime against the government. Crimes against the people aren't really considered as important.

    So, for example, you don't don't pay a 230% import duty on garlic to the Revenue, you will go to jail for a long time.

    You sodomise a young child, you might get half the time. Unless you're a priest, in which case you get no time.

    Hell, as a state we've even sanctioned slave labour camps where women were abused on an industrial level for generations.

    But that's all okay. Just don't f**king dare not pay our garlic tax. :rolleyes:


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    #358
    BarackPyjama
    Closed Accounts Posts: 974 ✭✭✭BarackPyjama


    Chucky the tree wrote: »
    No it doesn't. Your point was incorrect, that still remains. I'd hardly call one punch battering either.

    Ah yeah sure the old man only died. He probably deserved it for buying black market garlic. :rolleyes:


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    #359
    ArmaniJeanss
    Registered Users Posts: 13,340 ✭✭✭✭ArmaniJeanss


    You are jumping the shark now BP.


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    #360
    BarackPyjama
    Closed Accounts Posts: 974 ✭✭✭BarackPyjama


    M'eh.


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    #361
    benway
    Registered Users Posts: 1,061 ✭✭✭benway


    ArmaniJeanss wrote: »
    You are jumping the shark now BP.

    Seriously, brah.
    steddyeddy wrote: »
    As I said im not excusing him. What he did was wrong. Im not saying he shouldnt have been caught or put on trial or sentenced. Im wondering why this country always punishes people on the small end of the fraud scale.

    If we can't deal with the - relatively - small ones, what chance of action on the bigger ones?

    My fear in all of this is that public opinion will be manipulated into forcing the appeal court to give one white collar criminal a pass, and it'll set a yardstick, and an excuse not to pursue more difficult cases, because the public appetite to see guys like Begley locked up is lacking.

    People are talking as if it's obvious that white collar offences are minor in the grand scheme of things, in my opinion this couldn't be further from the truth.


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