An Isle of Man hotelier who channelled money through Jersey bank accounts before using it to help buy a villa in Spain has failed in a bid to have his case thrown out of Jersey’s Royal Court – despite insisting it was “palpable nonsense” to portray him as a “professional” launderer.
Martin John Hill (58), who previously admitted six money-laundering offences in Jersey, argued that the prosecution amounted to double jeopardy because he had already been convicted and punished in England for related VAT fraud offences.
A trail running from England to Jersey to Spain
A former hotelier running hotels in the Isle of Wight, Hill had hidden some of his proceeds from HMRC – making £350,000 of illicit cash that way.
Following an HMRC investigation, he reached a plea agreement in England in 2019.
While he pleaded guilty to VAT fraud offences, a number of money-laundering allegations were left “on file”, which meant he would not need to face court for them.
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Sign up for freeHowever, Jersey authorities later launched their own prosecution after identifying transactions through Santander International accounts in the Island. He was charged in 2024.
After pleading guilty to the Jersey offences, it was ordered that Hill be extradited to Jersey from his home in Alicante.
The legal process took almost two years, with Hill stating earlier this year that he hoped to appeal his extradition by going to the European Court of Human Rights earlier this year.
He is now due to be sentenced in Jersey, and prosecution documents have been circulated between the two sides.
But Hill tried yesterday to have his case thrown out or paused by claiming it was an “abuse of process” – a case of double jeopardy and a breach of international law.
“This is simply not permissible”
At a hearing this week, Advocate Paul Nicholls argued that Jersey was seeking to punish Hill twice for the same conduct, which he described in court as “oppressive”, “duplicative”, and “unfair”.
“This is simply not permissible,” he added.
The Advocate argued that UK authorities had been aware of the Jersey transactions when they prosecuted Hill and that “it is clear they analysed the Jersey transfers”, and had taken them into account when they made a confiscation order.
Hill had fully disclosed them in 2018, before he was convicted in the UK, the court was told.
Because Hill was sentenced in the UK on the “full criminal enterprise”, he argued that this “clearly” included the transfers to Jersey.
“The Jersey transactions were incontrovertibly part of the same continuous laundering chain which involved one predicate offence, the VAT fraud.”
He argued that the Island’s prosecutors had initially brought the charges because they thought the UK courts weren’t aware of the Jersey transactions, but that they had later “performed a volte face, instead seeking to argue, as it now does, that it is concerned with separate offending over a different time period which it erroneously seeks to say is entirely distinguishable from the criminality which the UK court was concerned with”.
Instead, he said, “Mr Hill has already been prosecuted, convicted, punished, and subjected to confiscation for his criminal enterprise”.
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Sign up for freeHill’s Jersey accounts were opened by Santander without his knowledge, he said, after the hotelier had asked for US dollar and euro facilities, rather than with money-laundering in mind.
“Palpable nonsense” that laundering efforts were “professional”
“It is palpable nonsense for the Crown to seek to suggest that we are concerned with a professional money-launderer,” he said.
Though his client had been dishonest, he said, the money-laundering wasn’t done “in a sophisticated, professional way”.
Unusually, the application for abuse of process came late – after Hill had already pleaded guilty.
This, Advocate Nicholls said, was justified in cases that are “fairly exceptional”.
“If we have a prosecution that is brought in breach of international law – and that is the case here – then we are firmly in that territory,” he added.
The double jeopardy was clear, he said, going on to maintain: “I think it is clearly in breach of international law.”
Two years in prison
He also noted that Hill had already served two years in prison and was now trying to rebuild.
“This is not a case of kicking a man when he’s down, it’s a case of kicking a man when he’s buried.”
Crown Advocate Sam Brown, prosecuting, said that the charges left to lie on file in England as part of the plea deal weren’t concerned with money-laundering using Jersey.
Jersey offences “different and distinct”
He added that the English offences took place during different dates.
The English offences were limited to a period between 2014 and 2016, while the Jersey offences took place between 2017 and 2018.
“The Jersey offences are different and distinct, in time, place, and subject matter,” he said.
And he cited the English judge, who noted “a sophistication” in the VAT fraud, as Hill used fake VAT registration numbers and layered his transfers to make them difficult to trace.
Those “buffer accounts” were used before the money went into a personal account and eventually used to buy properties in the Isle of Wight and in Spain.
Jersey’s financial system a “victim”
He added that the victim in the English offences was HM Treasury, while in the Jersey offences, the victim was Jersey.
Deilvering his decision, the Bailiff, Robert MacRae, agreed.
“The victim for the Jersey offending was Jersey’s financial system and its reputation,” he said.
He refused the applications to stay and drop the charges and refused leave to appeal to Advocate Nicholls.
Hill is due to appear in the Royal Court on Friday to fix a date for his sentencing.
