A large-scale com­mer­cial fraud trial which has been run­ning since 2017 has cul­min­ated in Jef­freys Bay busi­ness­man Gregory Fer­guson being jailed for eight years.

Fer­guson was sen­tenced in the Gqe­berha Com­mer­cial Crime Court this week.

According to the Daily Dispatch, he ini­tially faced seven charges of fraud and theft totalling almost R8m after con­vin­cing a string of busi­ness­men to invest in a res­id­en­tial golf estate, wine farm and res­taur­ant and then mis­ap­pro­pri­at­ing the funds.

But five of the charges against Fer­guson – who handed him­self over to the police in Decem­ber 2016 – were dis­missed after his defence team brought a sec­tion 174 applic­a­tion.

However, he was con­victed on the remain­ing two charges.

Between August 2005 and Feb­ru­ary 2011, Fer­guson served as a co-dir­ector of Cob Creek Estate (Pty) Ltd, estab­lished with the object­ive of devel­op­ing a pres­ti­gi­ous res­id­en­tial golf estate at Kabel­jous River in Jef­freys Bay.

As the sole sig­nat­ory with exclus­ive access to the com­pany’s busi­ness account, Fer­guson exer­cised con­trol over its fin­an­cial trans­ac­tions through Inter­net bank­ing facil­it­ies.

Without the con­sent or know­ledge of his two fel­low dir­ect­ors, Fer­guson fraud­u­lently soli­cited funds from unsus­pect­ing investors under the pre­text of fin­an­cing the estate’s devel­op­ment.

However, apart from a res­taur­ant, which was opened on the prop­erty in 2009 and was ini­tially prof­it­able between Feb­ru­ary and March 2010, the pro­posed devel­op­ment never mater­i­al­ised.

Instead, Fer­guson diver­ted the inves­ted funds, a veri­fied R4.4m, for the pur­poses of per­sonal enrich­ment and unre­lated busi­ness interests.

Fer­guson had pleaded not guilty.

On Monday, he was sen­tenced to eight years’ dir­ect impris­on­ment and declared unfit to pos­sess a fire­arm.

Full Daily Dispatch report