Scotland Yard accused of hiring out officers as it emerges Virgin paid police to investigate £144m fraud case

 

Scotland Yard was accused of hiring out officers for cash yesterday after Richard Branson’s business empire paid for police investigating a massive fraud. The cable television company Virgin Media agreed to fund the Metropolitan force’s overtime bill in an investigation into a set-box racket costing £144million a year. The firm paid police £5,060 following raids which revealed how thousands of viewers were using the boxes to view subscription channels without paying. Virgin Media also agreed to give the Metropolitan Police Authority (MPA) a quarter of any compensation awarded following a successful prosecution. One of the gang jailed over the set-box scam has launched an appeal, alleging that police were interested in the case only because of the money a conviction might bring in. The extraordinary deal, at a time of unprecedented police budget cuts, has raised wider questions about whether the force’s impartiality is compromised in the face of so-called incentives. The agreement between Virgin Media and the MPA was signed in November 2008 but did not come to light until after the conviction of three men for their part in the fraud, which involved 400,000 dodgy set-top boxes.