Businessmen guilty over cover-up

Three bosses from Kent and Sussex have been found guilty of covering up one of the UK's "worst commercial disasters".

Michael Bright, 63, former chief of Independent Insurance, was convicted of two counts of conspiracy to defraud at Southwark Crown Court on Tuesday.

Dennis Lomas, 56, was found guilty of the same offences and Philip Condon, 48, was convicted of one conspiracy to defraud charge and cleared of another.

About 1,000 jobs were lost in London, Manchester and Kent after the collapse.

Bright, of Biddington Road, Smarden, Kent and Lomas, of Balcombe Road, Haywards Heath, West Sussex, were also found guilty of "making incomplete disclosure" of its reinsurance agreements between 1998 and 2001.

Suppressed report

The court heard the trio hid the company's ailing health from fellow directors, professional advisors and investors in a bid to protect their reputations, jobs and salaries.

Undisclosed liabilities were "buried", figures manipulated and "bad" reinsurance contracts concealed.

Jurors were told they even "suppressed" a damning internal audit which highlighted major concerns a year before the company went under.

Bright, Lomas and Condon, from Sevenoaks, Kent, insisted they only ever did their job openly, honestly and to the best of their abilities.

Some of the firm's 500,000 private and corporate policyholders have been given £357m from the Financial Services Authority's (FSA) compensation scheme since the disaster in 2001.

Judge Rivlin remanded the trio in custody ahead of sentencing.