Catherine Salmon has urged authorities to “find every penny” lost to wine investment fraudsters after her father was scammed out of a substantial sum. Three men from London were jailed in October following a trial that revealed they had stolen at least £6 million from 41 victims.
Benjamin Cazaly, Dominic D’Sa, and Gregory Assemakis were found guilty of fraudulent trading after a Hertfordshire County Council trading standards investigation. Catherine, 62, of St Albans, described the men as “despicable” and called for a successful proceeds of crime case so the criminals would “feel the financial pain they inflicted.”
The jail sentences handed down at St Albans Crown Court were significant. Cazaly, 43, of Orpington, south-east London, received six and a half years. D’Sa, 46, from Wimbledon, south-west London, was sentenced to four and a half years, and Assemakis, 40, from Bromley, south-east London, was given three and a half years. Judge Jonathan Mann noted that some victims, including small investors, had lost pensions, homes, and in one case, a marriage.
The fraud was operated through a company called Imperial Wine & Spirits Merchant Ltd. Trading standards officers explained that although the prosecution focused on 41 victims, the company had defrauded hundreds more by convincing them to invest in fine Bordeaux wine, claiming profits would only be made when the wine was sold. In reality, the company had marked up prices by over 400 percent, leaving many investors with heavy financial losses.
Founded in 2008 by Cazaly as Imperial Wines of London, the company claimed to be a family-run investment house with offices in Paris and Hong Kong. In fact, it was a call centre in Groveland Court, London. Victims were manipulated into investing through false assurances and personal attention from staff.
Mrs Salmon has spoken about her father, Richard Burden, who was not part of the trial but lost £130,200 between May and November 2018. He died in 2024 aged 87. She described him as “a vulnerable, elderly, lonely, bereaved widower” who trusted the company. “He didn’t think for a moment that he was being scammed of a large chunk of his life-savings,” she said.
While praising investigators as “brilliant,” she stressed that their work was far from over. “Trading Standards, and ideally the police, now need to conduct a thorough investigation into the assets belonging to these shameless criminals and seize them,” she said. “I didn’t hear one word of remorse. It’s not enough that they’re in prison — they need to compensate their victims.”
Proceeds of crime cases enable courts to order that the assets of convicted criminals be used to compensate victims if they can be located. Ajanta Hilton, executive member for community safety at Hertfordshire County Council, said the impact on families had been “truly awful,” adding that trading standards officers are now conducting a financial investigation into the convicted men.
Judge Mann, who presided over the criminal trial, said he would oversee trading standards officers’ attempts to recover money from the fraudsters. He acknowledged the public interest in releasing images of the convicted men, stating it would help victims see “the people involved being named and shamed.”
The case is a stark reminder of the thriving “scam economy.” A recent analysis by verification service ClarityCheck revealed that fraudsters exploit empathy and politeness, with many victims being too polite to hang up when approached.
Catherine Salmon’s call for rigorous asset recovery underscores the ongoing fight to ensure victims of investment scams are compensated and justice is fully served.
