Crooked East Lothian man swindled £400k from company that employed him

Edinburgh Live

30-04-2025

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A crooked finance worker embezzled more than £400,000 to feed his out of control gambling habit while he was employed at an agricultural consultancy firm.
David Proudfoot was employed as a bookkeeper with Andersons Northern Ltd when he began transferring huge sums of cash from the accounts of two historic Scottish estates into his own.
Proudfoot managed to cover up his deceit by producing fake invoices and using bogus HMRC tax references while working with the company between 2012 and 2022.
Edinburgh Sheriff Court was told the 48-year-old had spent 'the overwhelming majority' of the stolen cash to fund his gambling habit with online sites including Betfair and Bet 365.
Proudfoot pleaded guilty to embezzling £439,500 while employed with Andersons Northern Ltd, Station Road, Musselburgh, East Lothian, when appeared at the capital court on Tuesday.
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Andersons Northern Ltd provides services to farming and non-farming businesses including financial planning, farm business administration and IT and software design.
Prosecutor Ruaridh Allison told the court the agricultural firm has around 150 clients including the Bemesyde Estate in the Scottish Borders and the Auchlyne Estate in Perthshire.
Mr Allison said the Bemesyde Estate was owned by Earl Haig of Bemesyde but was largely run by his wife Lady Jane Haig while the Auchlyne Estate was owned by sole trader Emma Paterson.
The court was told Proudfoot, of Penicuik, Midlothian, had responsibilities for 'managing tax affairs and VAT returns for some of the client estates' and the scam was uncovered in 2022.
The fiscal depute said: 'The offence came to light in August 2022 when the accountants of the Bemesyde Estate identified a VAT anomaly dating back to November 2021. 'The anomaly was £20,000 which was sufficient for an internal investigation to be met.'
Mr Allison said the accountancy firm contacted Andersons Northern Ltd and Proudfoot said he would investigate the anomaly but had subsequently 'failed to do so'.
A director of Andersons Northern then conducted his own investigation into the situation and discovered financial transactions were being paid into Proudfoot's personal bank account.
A larger review of all the accounts being managed by the bookkeeper was conducted and further payments from both estates were discovered and the police were contacted.
Mr Allison said a police investigation found 'over 200 payments disguised as payments for invoices' totalling £108,922.45 were made from the Bemesyde Estate account to Proudfoot between May 2012 and July 2022.
The court heard the missing funds went unnoticed as estate bosses had previously allowed Proudfoot to buy products on their behalf and he would be later reimbursed.
The fiscal said further payments amounting to more than £115,000 had also been made into Proudfoot's account under the reference of HMRC as he handled payments for two estate employees.
The police investigation uncovered a similar scam involving the Auchlyne Estate where Proudfoot had managed to embezzle more than £200,000 between 2014 and 2022.
Mr Allison said: 'Tax was being legitimately paid to HMRC by the accused but additional payments had been set and disguised as legitimate payments.
"The police then reviewed the accused's own bank statements in an effort to see where the money had been spent and the overwhelming majority appears to have been spent on gambling.
'They identified the accused has accounts with both Bet 365 and Betfair and payments made to those accounts totals hundreds of thousands of pounds.'
Proudfoot was arrested in June 2023 and was said to have given officers 'a full, frank and detailed account of his embezzlement' and had explained the methods he had used to take the money.
Sheriff Julius Komorowski granted Proudfoot bail and deferred sentence for the preparation of social work reports to next month.