Jon Woods and his offshore businesses to conceal taxable profits

To help maintain the secrecy, Mr Woods set up Ovenden lnvestments which is registered in the British Virgin lslands and is administered through Guernsey. By doing this he has managed to keep his involvement in what is a controversial development, secret.

Over the years, Mr Kenny worked very hard for Mr Woods finding and buying land sites for him but the two men never signed a formal agreement to share future profits on their big buys – particularly the Powerhouse venture.

Unfortunately, Mr Kenny, a hugely popular man and great raconteur, died suddenly in 2001.

At the time he was in the process of formalising the verbal agreement with Mr Woods ensuring his 50% spilt of future profits, but he died before this was actioned – although deeds of trust were set-up for other properties worth £1.5m.

Most lucrative partnerships would go under at this point with Mr Kenny’s drive and experience having disappeared, but all was not lost, however, as Mr Kenny’s son Nicholas stepped into the breach and carried on where his father left off. In the next four years, he did so well he made £450,000 profit for Mr Woods

Nicholas willingly undertook this work on the strict understanding that the previous agreements still stood. The Yew Tree Farm venture which is in a fantastic 104 acre location for a housing development in Burscough, West Lancashire, was sold by Mr Woods later for a £1million loss (even though surveyors valued it at much more). It is now earmarked for 1,000 new homes!

So why would such an astute businessman such as Mr Woods do something as incredible as that?

The answer, it seems, is a business tactic that would deny his deceased partner’s family a share in future profits of their partnership when it was already carrying such a big loss.

Confused? So were the Kenny family and in the coming months – despite Mr Wood’s repeated assurances that everything about the deal with Mr Kenny would be respected – he then went for Mrs Kenny, a  widow who couldn’t stand up to Mr Wood’s endless bullying tactics.