Leslie Thompson, from Bathgate, is facing legal action after escaping the African nation, he is being sued by telecoms company, Safaricom, with regards to £709,000 owed by his firm.

A West Lothian conman who was outed over their involvement in a £20million VAT tax swindle is wanted by Kenyan officials over alleged unpaid debt to one Africa's largest mobile phone operators.

Leslie Thompson, from Bathgate, is facing legal action after escaping the African nation, he is being sued by telecoms company, Safaricom, with regards to an alleged £709,000 owed by his firm.feeling robbed

Separately, Thompson was one of 20 fraudsters convicted as part of a sprawling conspiracy to defraud the UK public purse following a decade-long HMRC probe. He was jailed for six years in March 2024, the Daily Record reports.

Court documents from Safaricom’s lawsuit in Kenya, seen by the Sunday Mail, show Thompson’s firm abandoned its offices in capital Nairobi in 2016 and transferred its shares to a company registered in the Seychelles, an offshore tax haven.

They allege this was “an engineered ploy” for Thompson and a second business partner to flee the East African nation and “escape paying the debt due” to Safaricom. 

Thompson’s company, Iphone Global Systems Ltd, which offered voice over internet protocol (VOIP) services, had entered a deal with Safaricom in 2006 to connect their networks.

But a decade later, the firm began to stop paying debts it owed Safaricom built up as part of the arrangement. Last year, a judge in Nairobi ordered Thompson and a second former company director to return to Kenya to attend court to answer for the unpaid debt. The ruling added the men would be held “personally liable” for the money if they failed to show up.

Earlier this month, it was reported how Thompson, 63, along with his wife and son, were nailed by HMRC investigators as part of an elaborate VAT tax fraud plot involving metals and electrical goods.

His wife Beverley, 60, was handed a two-year suspended sentence last month for money laundering.

She allowed up to £250,000 to flow through her bank accounts as she and her husband enjoyed a lavish lifestyle including regular jet-setting to holiday homes in Florida.

Meanwhile, Thompson’s son Andrew Collins, 41, was handed a 22-month suspended jail sentence over his part in the scheme to rip off taxpayers.

The HMRC probe centred on a company called Winnington Networks, in Crewe, Cheshire, which used a network of firms to trade in metals, electrical items and telecommunications while generating false VAT returns.

Leslie recruited for the fraudulent scheme by preying on legitimate businesspeople to use their companies in fake trading chains. By Dan Vevers Jacob Farr Reporter, edinburgh Live