Branson. Tom Bower

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СКАЧАТЬ of records were proffered and, after securing the official stamp on the PT 999 form from the Customs officer, driven unseen back to London. The van rarely transported the records specified on the consignment. Instead, a batch of worthless recordings of the Band of the Irish Guards was loaded. Over a period of months, Virgin’s mail-order business attracted gratitude from a growing army of music fans.

      By the time Mike Knox reported to his superiors – ‘Virgin looks dicey. It’s worth an operation’ – about twenty young employees, enjoying the permanent party atmosphere encouraged by Branson, were dispatching the ‘export’ records by post from the warehouse in Paddington. Among the thousands of customers were Mike Knox and Dick Brown, his deputy in the Customs investigation team, ordering records as normal customers from their home addresses.

      Their investigation had started after a visit to EMI’s head of security in Hayes, west London. Knox had confessed his bewilderment to the record producer’s head of security about Branson’s ability to sell his records cheaper than the shops. The former policeman employed by EMI admitted his own suspicions that ‘Something’s fishy’.

      ‘I’ll look at his PT 999s,’ thought Knox.

      Reading through the thick wodge of Customs certificates accumulated by Branson over the previous ten months, Knox noticed the official stamps at Dover testifying to his regular export of records in batches of at least 10,000 to every country in Western Europe and to the United States. Knox was particularly intrigued by two certificates. On both occasions Branson had, according to the certificate, exported 30,000 records in a Land Rover. Amid the clatter of Branson’s office, no one heard the staid ‘tax clerk’ murmur to himself, ‘You can’t load 30,000 records on to a Land Rover.’ Shortly afterwards, a surveillance unit had been established in St Mary’s Hospital, overlooking Branson’s offices.

      Every night at 3 a.m. over the following three weeks, Dick Brown arrived at EMI’s headquarters. Neatly stacked in the record producer’s loading bay were boxes marked for delivery to Virgin, invariably with a note on the invoice: ‘For export’. Regularly, Branson was ordering two hundred copies of ‘She’s a Lady’, Tom Jones’s hit, apparently for export to Switzerland. To monitor the fate of those records, Brown marked on each record a letter of the alphabet with an ultra violet pen, invisible to the naked eye. ‘A’ was given for the first day and consecutive letters were marked on each successive day’s consignment. The copy of ‘She’s a Lady’ delivered by post to Brown’s home from Virgin bore the ultra violet mark.

      At the end of the three weeks’ surveillance, Knox gazed down at the building forlornly. No Land Rover had appeared at the warehouse and no large consignment had been loaded on to the white Transit. The report sheets were blank. The only unusual activity was Branson’s departure early that morning by taxi and his return by taxi late in the afternoon. ‘I’ll phone Dover,’ groaned Knox. Unknown to Knox, Branson had refined the mechanics of his fraud. To maximise his profits, he had searched for ways to save costs. Since the frequent passage through Dover had not aroused any suspicion, Branson had avoided the expense of sending the Transit to Dover by dispatching someone to the port by train. Knox’s telephone call to Dover exposed the refinement. That same morning, Branson had presented in Dover an export certificate for 10,000 records. ‘Cheeky chappy,’ smiled the Customs investigator. ‘He went cheap, on an away-day.’

      Knox decided to raid the premises after Branson submitted his next purchase tax returns. After a three-month investigation, his schedule, covering dozens of pages, listed ‘hundreds of phoney exports’ which had profited Branson the equivalent of £370,000 in the year 2000. ‘It’s a big case,’ he concluded.

      An anonymous telephone call the night before the raid sparked frantic activity inside Virgin’s warehouse. The caller was a disgruntled Customs officer, jealous of Knox, warning about the plan. Before daybreak, Branson and two co-conspirators had transferred the ‘export’ records from the warehouse to the new Virgin shop in Oxford Street. Virgin’s employees arrived the following morning unaware of any tension. Even John Varnom, a member of the ‘family’, would remain oblivious about the tip-off and the night-time transfer. Branson felt no compunction to say more than necessary. He already understood the importance of secrecy in creating successful businesses.

      Cool nonchalance greeted the team of determined Customs investigators waving a search warrant at 10 o’clock in the morning. The ‘gangly, laid-back, long-haired lad’ with a mop of fair hair, affecting the nasal tone of Mick Jagger to suffocate his natural upper-class twang, betrayed no hint of concern. He was even, Mike Knox reflected, rather welcoming.

      Act One of the performance was perfect. ‘It’s all legal,’ Branson smiled benignly, showing the Customs forms stamped at Dover. ‘You won’t find any export records here.’ The same bluff used successfully at the magistrates court to minimise the prosecution for poaching, he hoped, could disorientate the investigators.

      ‘We personally bought these records from your mail order company,’ snapped Dick Brown waving his copy of ‘She’s a Lady’. ‘They were marked for export. Here’s the paperwork. And here’s your signature on the PT 999. There’s no doubt. Now where’s the stock?’

      ‘Oh fuck.’ Branson was stunned. Public humiliation provoked tears. Discovery was not part of the plot. Tears dripped from his cheek on to his blue jumper. For once, his weakness could not be turned into a virtue. The performance was terminated. ‘We hid them in Oxford Street.’ A gulp. ‘Can I phone my mother?’

      ‘There’s a bit of a problem,’ choked Branson on the line to Shamley Green, deep in the Surrey Jag and gin belt.

      ‘He’s as good as gold,’ decided Brown as he listened to Ricky explain his plight on the telephone. Their catch was a vulnerable, public schoolboy, ‘not the usual toe-rag but an entrepreneur, and a good bloke’.

      ‘Look upstairs,’ ordered Brown over the telephone to the team searching through the stock in Oxford Street. Within the hour, Branson was shown the ultra violet markings on the records brought from the West End. ‘If only I’d known,’ he spluttered, secretly angry that the records had not been destroyed the previous night.

      ‘You’re under arrest,’ announced Brown. ‘We’d like you to come with us now to Dover.’

      ‘Oh God,’ blabbed Branson, suddenly aware of his plight. But his good humour soon revived. Searching through his desk, an officer had pulled out a half empty packet of condoms. Glancing at all the pretty young girls in the building, the officer sighed. These were not villains, he realised, but sex-obsessed hippies living on a different planet from Customs officers. His prisoner smiled. The ‘scene’ – sex, music and friendship – mitigated the gravity of his crime. His charm undermined any remaining barriers.

      ‘I’m starting out in my career,’ explained Branson, as the Customs official’s car crossed the River Thames heading towards the Channel port. ‘I’ve just opened one shop and I’m building a recording studio in a manor I’ve bought in Oxfordshire.’

      ‘You should open shops in Bristol and Birmingham,’ suggested Brown, warming to the young man. ‘Paying your staff such low wages, you’ll be a millionaire one day.’

      ‘Do you think so, Dick?’ replied Branson, breaking down another barrier. ‘My bankers are the problem. We’re always short of cash. I need a couple of guys like you in suits to work for me.’ The charm was natural.

      The joviality continued during an unscheduled lunch stop in a pub. Distracted by Branson’s manner, Brown allowed his prisoner to drink alcohol, a breach of regulations. An unusually warm relationship had developed despite the Customs officer’s realisation of the fundamental dishonesty of Branson’s financial accounts. Not only СКАЧАТЬ