The former chairman of a UK group that represents the payment services industry has been convicted of laundering the proceeds of an investment fraud worth £850,000 and involving more than 60 victims.

Dominic Thorncroft, 56, was found guilty at Southwark Crown Court of one count of money laundering, one count of breaching money laundering regulations and four counts of retaining a wrongful credit.

Thorncroft was the former chair of the Association of UK Payment Institutions who worked with lawmakers and financial regulators providing anti-money laundering advice and training.

An investigation by the Metropolitan Police, which began in 2016, found evidence that linked Thorncroft to an investment fraud which took place in 2014. The investigation revealed that Thorncroft had knowinglyu allowed his Money Service Bureau business to be used by fraudsters to transfer money to Hong Kong and China.

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and the police were able to prove that Thorncroft must have suspected that the money passing through his business’s bank accounts was criminal property but failed to alert the authorities. All told, the failings cost the sixty-plus victims more than three quarters of a million pounds

Stephane Pendered of the CPS says: “Dominic Thorncroft did not commit the fraud himself. However, his actions have allowed £850,000 defrauded from 60 individuals to be dispersed across the world.

“Thorncroft promoted himself as an anti-money laundering expert but failed to live up to the standards he set for others.

“When his business was clearly being used to launder criminal property, he chose to ignore what was happening. He presumably did so for his own personal gain, enjoying the commissions from money deprived from victims and transferred across the globe.”