Former Norton Motorcycles owner receives suspended jail sentence

Stuart Garner

Stuart Garner, the former boss of Norton Motorcyles, has been sentenced to eight months in prison – suspended for two years – after pleading guilty to illegal pension investments.

Garner appeared before Derby Crown Court on Thursday (March 31) and received three 12-month sentences, which were reduced to eight months, to run concurrently. They were subseqently suspended for two years. He was also ordered to pay £20,716.69 in costs and has been disqualified from being a director for three years.

Garner admitted illegally investing £11m into the business from three pension schemes for which he was the sole trustee.

Garner, of Park Lane, Castle Donington, pleaded guilty to three charges of breaching employer-related investment (ERI) rules by investing more than 5% of assets from each scheme into his business, Norton Motorcycle Holdings.

The offences were in relation to three defined contribution schemes: Dominator 2012, Commando 2012 and Donington MC which had a total of 227 scheme members. The investments, which were made in return for preference shares, were made between 2012 and 2013.

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