A Northern Ireland solicitor who helped a crime baron to launder the proceeds of a fuel tax scam was jailed for three months yesterday.
Brian Dougan (49), from Milford, Co Armagh, carried out conveyancing work on two properties for Thomas McCague and allowed £66,000 to pass through his client account. He did not initially realise that the cash came from a criminal source, but he continued with the work even when he became suspicious.
Dougan had pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing at Liverpool Crown Court to one count of converting or transferring the proceeds of criminal conduct.
Sentencing him at the same court yesterday, Judge David Swift accepted that Dougan was a naive victim of a sophisticated criminal, but he said that solicitors had to "take the greatest care" to stop others using their respectability to launder cash.
Dougan, a working solicitor since 1982, was originally on trial for the more serious charge of conspiring to conceal the proceeds of crime. He pleaded guilty to the less serious charge as soon as it was offered, and the crown offered no further evidence on the conspiracy count.
Tim Holroyd QC, defending, provided lengthy mitigation in which he stressed how Dougan - a previous pillar of the church and hunting community - had been shattered by the loss of his reputation. "In a small community, there can be a high degree of shame, and that is what this defendant has suffered."
The court heard that Dougan had been asked to stand down as an elder in his local church, where he also plays the organ, and from the committee of his masonic lodge.
Dougan, dressed in a pinstripe suit, wept in the dock as the court heard about his loss of status.
Dougan has been forced to sell his practice and is expected to be barred from running a sole practice by the Law Society. He may be allowed to work in a limited role as an assistant solicitor.- (PA)