Spending £16m in Harrods wouldn’t be that easy, not for me anyway. Although the woman referred to took about 10 years to do it. Purchasing a lower league football club would probably be one of the easiest ways of burning through that amount of cash.
On a separate note, the media are suggesting this is a case of money laundering on a huge scale. I thought money laundering was when you used cash from illegal activities (“dirty money”) and exchanged it for goods, property or clean money. This woman made all her purchases using bank cards that are linked to the foreign bank that her husband is currently in jail for embezzling. So there is a very good chance the money she spent is not hers, but is it money laundering or just fraud?
If the intention was to then sell the jewellery/property on, so turning dirty money into clean money then it's laundering.
If the intention was to hang onto the jewellery/property then it's fraud.
If she has been sensible she will have bought a certain amount of bullion which is then hidden somewhere, and also moved a percentage of the money into offshore corporations and trust funds.
However I suspect the husband with a banking background was the one with the brain and would have known what to do.
However he is currently doing 15 years inside for embezzlement and so wont be able to do anything
She has just spent the cash, and done so in such a way as to pop up on the HMRC radar (no doubt following a tip off from the Azerbaijani authorities)
