LONDON — A British businessman and a Greek national who served as an adviser to a UK government-funded body have been jailed for 16 years each for illegally brokering arms deals worth tens of millions of pounds.
Ugandan socialite Bad Black’s former lover David Greenhalgh, 68, from Croydon, and Christos Farmakis, 48, were sentenced at Southwark Crown Court on Wednesday after being found guilty in June of running a sophisticated black-market arms operation between 2009 and 2016.
Court heard that the pair acted as middlemen for the supply of ex-Soviet fighter jets, surface-to-air missile systems, anti-tank missiles and thousands of assault rifles destined for war-torn and embargoed countries including Sudan, South Sudan and Libya.
Prosecutor Edmund Burge told court that Farmakis used his position as an adviser to Greater London Enterprise (GLE), a body funded by local and central government, as a respectable front while conducting the deals. He also used fake credentials from UK Trade & Investment to give himself an air of authority.
The duo forged end-user certificates to disguise the true destinations of the weapons, falsely claiming they were headed to non-sanctioned countries. The court heard this was “routinely achieved” through corrupt payments to public officials.
Judge Sally-Ann Hales KC said their offending was “deliberate, sophisticated, financially motivated and persisted over many years.”
“The evidence established a long-standing and mutually beneficial criminal enterprise,” she said.
Greenhalgh was convicted of 10 counts of being knowingly concerned in acts calculated to promote the unlicensed supply of controlled goods to an embargoed destination. Farmakis was convicted of nine counts of the same offence.
Farmakis fled the UK after being granted bail and was tried and sentenced in his absence. He is believed to be living in Greece. Attempts to bring him back for sentencing failed.
Greenhalgh, who the judge said presented himself as a “wheeler and dealer” involved in legitimate businesses like exporting second-hand clothes to Africa, sugar refineries and copper mines, appeared alone in the dock.
“Those achievements make your conscious decision to engage in serious criminal conduct all the more disappointing,” Judge Hales told him.
The investigation was led by HMRC.
