Five men sentenced for selling carbon credits at £5.26 to £6.50 each when the real price was 25p to 30p, to people aged 50 and over
Sami Raja, 32, of Grays, Essex, was sentenced to eight years at Southwark Crown Court in January 2019 for his part in a £2.4 million carbon credit fraud. With four others he mis-sold carbon credits through two companies, Harman Royce Ltd and Kendrick Zale Ltd, between January 2012 and August 2013. Four others were sentenced in September 2018.
- Year
- 2019
- Where
- United Kingdom
- Outcome
- Sentenced
- Victims
- 130
- Schemes
- Carbon credit fraud
- Last reviewed
- 2026-10-28
The facts, as recorded
- Raja was found guilty of six counts of conspiracy to defraud and money laundering.
- Harman Royce's 'brokers', often using fake names, phoned homeowners aged 50 and over in affluent postcodes to persuade them to invest in voluntary emission reductions (VERs), a type of carbon credit.
- Between January and October 2012, 130 victims were charged between £5.26 and £6.50 per credit, totalling a loss of £1.5 million. An independent consultant's evidence put the real trading price at between 25p and 30p.
- The consultant also said VER carbon credits have no secondary market, so Harman Royce's projected profits of between 6% and 100% over four months to 10 years were false.
- Victims were given a bogus 'carbon market analysis' spreadsheet claiming to show monthly changes in carbon credit prices between 2007 and 2012.
- Harman Royce's money paid staff wages and bought luxury items including an Aston Martin worth £33,000 and a £4,000 watch.
- Kendrick Zale used similar tactics, selling Certified Emission Reductions at an inflated price. Between May and August 2013 it sold over 300,000 units to 28 investors for £900,000. Many investors cashed in ISAs or sold shares to buy.
- Police executed a search warrant in September 2013 and seized client lists, scripts, brochures and contract notes.
- In September 2018 Sandeep Dosanjh, a company director, was sentenced to four years and six months; James Lanston, a senior broker, to two years and three months; and Charanjit Sandhu, another senior broker, to three years. Michael Nascimento, convicted of three counts of money laundering in the carbon credit case, got two years for each count, concurrent, on top of 11 years in a separate case.
Why this case matters
The numbers in the police account are the case: victims paid £5.26 to £6.50 per credit when an independent consultant’s evidence put the trading price at 25p to 30p, and the consultant said the credits had no secondary market, so the projected profits could not have been realised. The same group closed one company and opened another months later, the Senior Investigating Officer said, and used similar tactics.
Who was targeted
According to the police, brokers sought the contact details of homeowners aged 50 and above in affluent postcodes. The article quotes the investigating officer saying Raja targeted often elderly individuals with the intention of defrauding them of their life savings.
The caveat
The sentences are those reported by Financial Planning Today in September 2018 and January 2019, from police statements. Nascimento’s 11-year sentence was for a separate share fraud, not the carbon credit case. The reports give the loss in pounds, which this page does not convert. The sentencing date for Raja is given only as “Friday” before the article of 21 January 2019, so this page says January 2019.
Sources
- Fraudster gets 8 year sentence for role in £2.4m carbon credit con. Financial Planning Today. Accessed 2026-10-28. Supports: Raja's sentence, the two companies, the targeting of homeowners over 50, the prices charged and the real price, the lack of a secondary market, the spreadsheet, the spending, the Kendrick Zale sales and the search warrant.
- 'Despicable' conman jailed for 13 years over £5.2m frauds. Financial Planning Today. Accessed 2026-10-28. Supports: The September 2018 sentences of Dosanjh, Lanston, Sandhu and Nascimento, the £2.4 million and 130 victims, and the use of ISAs and shares to pay.