Corrupt QS caught-out by spurned mistress

A crooked quantity surveyor and a former National Grid engineer whose mistress revealed he had been defrauding the company when their affair ended face financial ruin after a High Court ruling.
 
Mr Justice Norris ordered engineer Andrew McKenzie, who was earning less than £40,000 a year, to pay compensation which could potentially run to nearly £1 million to the electrics giant as well as £500,000 in legal costs.

The judge said that McKenzie, who lives in Goole, North Humberside, had been guilty of a string of "corrupt" practices including taking bribes in return for labour contracts.

The Daily Telegraph reported that quantity surveyor Alan Denis Read, 58, of Rye, East Sussex, was also ordered to hand over damages and costs to National Grid after the judge ruled he was a "co-conspirator" in the scam, which ran between 2002 and 2006.

The judge said Read was involved in projects run by Mr McKenzie from January 2005. His potential bill could be £430,000, plus £500,000 in costs.

However National Grid failed to recover all of the £5.267m compensation it had sought at the High Court, together with costs exceeding £4m.

The judge also criticised its approach to the case, describing the way it had thrown money at it, including paying a firm of solicitors in Thailand to investigate the dates of a holiday Mr McKenzie took, as "profligate".

The judge said: "I formed the view that the case was more about the relentless pursuit of Mr McKenzie and Mr Read (in order to make examples of them in case others with whom National Grid dealt might be similarly tempted to do what was alleged) and about the vindication of National Grid's management team than it was about the recovery of compensation for alleged wrongs."

He added that the compensation sum sought was "vastly in excess" of that which National Grid had accepted from McKenzie and Read's alleged co-conspirators, and "far beyond" what they were claimed to have received.

Before the trial against McKenzie, Read and Read's company, Harbour Management Resources Ltd, began, a number of other individuals and companies settled legal proceedings which had been brought against them by National Grid.

As well as finding that McKenzie received "bribes" of £126,908, including flights to Thailand and a £34,000 Audi car, Mr Justice Norris said he was guilty of other financial wrongdoing.

He ruled that McKenzie – and to a lesser extent Read – were liable to pay compensation for labour contracts which had been overcharged, fuel charges which had been wrongly claimed, profits they had made from works in Devon and South Wales and two cars which had been wrongly procured.

McKenzie was also found liable to pay compensation for a string of other vehicle frauds, including a Land Rover Freelander which he had arranged for his mistress – who also worked for National Grid – to drive.

When their affair ended, she blew the whistle to National Grid, who began legal proceedings in 2006.

Describing McKenzie as a "highly competent" and "hard working" engineer, Mr Justice Norris said that he carried a workload of 120 per cent and delivered all his projects within budget and to time and "achieved results".

But the judge added that he had come to the court "to lie to me, and he did so".

In a statement released after the hearing, National Grid said: "We are pleased that the court has found in our favour.

"National Grid takes any allegation of fraudulent activity very seriously and will always investigate to establish if wrongdoing has occurred."