LAST UPDATE | 20 Jun 2018

FORMER ANGLO IRISH bank CEO David Drumm has been jailed for six years for his role in a multi-billion euro bank fraud scheme in 2008.

Earlier this month, a jury at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court returned unanimous verdicts of guilty on a charge of conspiracy to defraud and one of false accounting, after just over ten and a half hours of deliberations.

Judge Karen O’Connor delivered the sentence shortly after 4pm this afternoon and said that any time already spent in custody should be taken into consideration.

The maximum prison sentence for conspiracy to defraud is unlimited, while the maximum jail term for false accounting is ten years.

Drumm (51) of Skerries, Co. Dublin was on bail throughout the 87-day trial, the third longest criminal trial in the history of the State.

His bail was continued after his conviction and he was present in court for the hearing this morning, dressed in a navy suit and an open collared blue shirt.

During this hearing his lawyers told the court he had instructed them not to put forward any testimonials or character references.

Brendan Grehan SC said that since his client became the chief executive of the Anglo Irish Bank “his life had been an open book” and he did not wish to have others exposed to further adverse publicity or loss of privacy.

It was the State’s case that Drumm conspired with Irish Life & Permanent’s former CEO, Denis Casey, Anglo’s former financial director Willie McAteer and former head of treasury at Anglo, John Bowe, among others, to carry out €7.2 billion in fraudulent circular transactions in order to bolster the customer deposits figure on Anglo’s balance sheet.

The State also alleged that this €7.2 billion was falsely accounted for as part of the bank’s customer deposits in preliminary accounts published on December 3rd 2008, therefore misleading the market as to Anglo’s true strength.

Bowe (54) from Glasnevin, Dublin, McAteer (67) of Greenrath, Tipperary Town, Co. Tipperary and Casey (58) from Raheny, Dublin were convicted in June 2016 on the conspiracy to defraud charges.

Judge Martin Nolan jailed Casey for two years and nine months after telling him that Anglo were the authors of the scheme but that he had behaved disgracefully and reprehensibly in co-operating with it.

He jailed McAteer for three and a half years and imposed a two-year prison sentence on Bowe.

Drumm, of Skerries, Co Dublin, had pleaded not guilty to conspiring to defraud depositors and investors at Anglo by “dishonestly” creating the impression that deposits in 2008 were €7.2 billion larger than they were.

He had also pleaded not guilty to false accounting on 3 December, 2008, by furnishing information to the market that Anglo’s 2008 deposits were €7.2 billion larger than they were.