Sunbed boss who used £650k home as cannabis farm must pay back £7,500 (From Warrington Guardian)

Penketh sunbed boss Norman King who used £650k home as cannabis farm must pay back £7,500

7:20am Thursday 27th September 2012 in News

Norman King

A FORMER sunbed boss who fraudulently obtained a mortgage has been ordered to pay back less than £8,000.

Warrington Crown Court heard on Friday how Norman King, of Tannery Lane, Penketh, had benefited from his crime to the tune of £466,318.78 but the only amount available to seize was £7,593.

He will have six months to pay the amount or face a further four months’ imprisonment.

The Warrington Guardian reported in May last year how King used his £650,000 property to house a drugs farm and used fake payslips to secure a mortgage for The Bungalow in Penketh.

The 43-year-old, who previously owned a series of tanning salons, pleaded guilty to the production of cannabis and fraud after police uncovered the cannabis farm in August 2009.

Around 200 plants were discovered with a street value of £55,000.

King told the court he did not realise the scale of the cannabis operation but the raid led officers to uncover his deceit in mortgage dealings with the Royal Bank of Scotland after a string of missed payments.

He blocked repossession of his home in 2007 after borrowing cash from a private finance company in Monaco.

King then persuaded a Salford resident to register The Bungalow in her name to obtain another mortgage and used fake pay slips to claim they earned a combined annual salary of £181,000.

Judge Nicholas Woodward sentenced King to 21 months for producing cannabis and three months for fraud in May last year.

The court had investigated the value of properties King owned in Spain but found there was no money remaining in the property.