Presiding judge, Mr Justice Patten, said that Mr Ghassemian's
conduct of the company affairs had been "wholly unacceptable". He
added, "I am afraid to say that he struck me as both devious and
dishonest and in short was willing to say or do anything to fend
off the legitimate enquiries of the regulatory authorities."
During the course of an investigation by the Department of Trade
and Industry it emerged that the company carried out an
unauthorised insurance business, refused to co-operate with the
Financial Services Authority, forged documents and attempted to
raise £1.5 million using a bogus on-line share option scheme.
The main finding against the company was the misleading nature
of the motor warranty cover it sold on-line from its site at
equity-provident.com. The site still exists at the time of writing.
For around £140 a time, customers bought warranties which they
believed would provide replacement car parts free of charge. In
reality, the company did nothing more than promise to consider
claims made under the warranties. There was no obligation to pay
out.
Mr Justice Patten agreed with the DTI's complaint that the
company did not give a true indication of the nature of the
policies, and said that any customers buying them would not be
aware they were "potentially if not actually worthless".
In his defence, Mr Ghassemian claimed that the company had
honoured many of the policies and provided hand-written forms from
claimants in evidence. The judge remarked that he had "doubt about
the reliabililty of this evidence", when it was discovered that the
majority of the claimants were either not listed on the electoral
roll or were dead.
