A former RBS banker who lost nearly £500,000 of investors’ money in his failed property empire has been jailed for nine months.
Bob Quigley promised handsome returns for friends and family who ploughed their savings into his buy-to-let property business.
But when property prices collapsed, so did Quigley’s land and property empire – along with the hopes and dreams of the people who entrusted him with their life savings.
Livingston Sheriff Court earlier heard that some of the illegal deals involved property in the Borders. John Lithgow, who had a property being managed by Quigley’s company, agreed to invest £30,000 in development land in the Galashiels area.
But like several other investors, he received a mobile phone text message in June 2009. It read: “Truly sorry to tell you that I don’t think I can go on like this. Goodnight and God bless.”
Quigley, 46, from Livingston, pleaded guilty to accepting cash deposits without being regulated by the Financial Services Authority.
He admitted taking £470,000 from five investors between October 2006 and February 2009. All the money was lost.
The court was told he worked in the banking industry as a financial adviser with the Royal Bank of Scotland for two years before setting up his buy-to-let firm in 2003.
Lorenzo Alonzi, defending, said Quigley’s property company had grown rapidly during its first three years.
He said: “Mr Quigley had seen a 16 per cent per annum growth in the value of that portfolio. He was doing very, very well.
“Of course he regrets the half-a-million pounds he lost, but he didn’t deceive anyone and it’s not a case of him benefiting from other people’s loss.
“Mr Quigley lost everything himself, as did his family – not to mention the humiliation and embarrassment of everything that’s fallen on the family.
“It didn’t cross his mind to apply for authorisation and it didn’t cross anyone’s mind to ask, ‘Is that chap authorised?’.”
Passing sentence last Friday, Sheriff Susan Craig said Quigley had promised to repay his investors with interest.
She told him: “You made promises to them of a return they’d get on that money in circumstances where you were not authorised to give that advice. There’s the thick end of £500,000 been lost as a result of your unauthorised activity.
“The whole point of registration through the Financial Services Authority is to ensure that investment advice is being given by people who are qualified to give it. If they are being foolish in their investment decisions, they’re being protected from themselves and from people like you.
“The effect of you giving advice you weren’t authorised to give has left a number of people with a very significant financial loss.
“I need to mark the circumstances of this matter by imposing a custodial sentence.”
Quigley was trading under the name of Lothian Property Portfolios and the biggest financial losers were Timothy Rice and his mother, Sarah, who ploughed £240,000 into the ill-fated scheme.