DOING TIMESHARE; Businessman locked up for pounds 30m hols isle fraud.

Byline: JEFF EDWARDS Chief Crime Correspondent

A BUSINESSMAN - cleared of handling Brinks Mat gold - was in jail last night for masterminding a pounds 30million timeshare fraud.

John Palmer, 51, who is worth pounds 300million, and his lover Christina Ketley, 40, were convicted of conspiracy to defraud.

Palmer had told the court that the police were out to get him after he was acquitted in the pounds 26million bullion heist in 1993. He went to Tenerife where he had a timeshare business started in the 1980s.

But he told the Old Bailey: "They have done anything to try and get me, and have spent millions and millions of pounds - public money - to get me." David Farrer QC, prosecuting, said his timeshare customers were lied to and given false promises in a "slick, well- orchestrated and thoroughly dishonest operation".

He said that victims "were invariably couples. The majority of them lost several thousands". They were of quite ordinary means, some with very modest incomes. Some were pensioners.

"This was not an exotic fraud of finance houses or banks but on people like any sitting in this court. It could be you or the person sitting next to you."

Palmer, of Bath, will be sentenced on Monday. Ketley, of Brentwood, Essex, is on bail pending reports. The jury still has to reach a verdict on Palmer's nephew Andrew, 32, of Solihull, West Midlands.

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JAILED: John Palmer