A tax-dodging mobile phone tycoon from Golders Green fleeced firms to make his multi-million pound fortune in one year, Blackfriars Crown Court heard this week.

Aryeh Kramer, 29, of Princes Park Avenue, sold handsets worth more than £35million to corporate customers in Slough, Worcestershire and Stoke-on-Trent.

Michael Brompton, prosecuting, told the court Mr Kramer charged the firms the full rate of VAT on mobile phone sales but did not hand it over to the tax authorities.

He is believed to have put away £6.5million of the proceeds in bank accounts in Israel and Switzerland before his arrest.

Mr Kramer, who denies two counts of VAT evasion, was the sole director of Eurofreight, which he ran from Sunny Gardens Parade, Hendon, the court heard. Mr Brompton told the court the company was little more than the smokescreen for fraud.

In 1997 Mr Kramer set up two firms Eurocom Trading UK Ltd, and Alfa Communications Ltd, both registered in Lambeth but run from his Hendon office and banked cash from deals into Eurofreight's account. In a number of deals, Mr Kramer cheated £4million in VAT from three companies, it is alleged.

Mr Brompton added: "As they imported the phones from abroad, virtually all the £4million should have been paid over to Customs and Excise. In fact they didn't pay a single penny."

The first count of VAT evasion, with Eurocom Ltd, is between July 24, 1998 and March 12, 1999. The second count is with Alfa Communications between November 23 1998 and June 1999.

The trial continues.

November 14, 2001 17:13