A judge has issued an arrest warrant for the disgraced former Co-operative Bank chairman Paul Flowers after he failed to appear at court for his fraud sentencing.
In July, Flowers, 74, pleaded guilty to a catalogue of fraud amounting to nearly £100,000, relating to his abuse of position as the executor of the will and holder of power of attorney for a woman named Margaret Jarvis.
On Friday, Manchester Crown Court heard that Flowers had ‘disengaged’ with his legal team, although a solicitor had contacted him on Thursday night to explain the consequences of not attending court.
Judge Nicholas Dean KC, the Honorary Recorder of Manchester, issued a warrant not backed for bail.
A number of preliminary hearings in the case were previously aborted when Flowers cited health problems, and in November 2023 another crown court judge issued a similar warrant when Flowers did not appear as scheduled.
A court in July heard he spent almost £1,500 of Mrs Jarvis’ cash on wine from The Wine Society and also used £1,300 of her money to pay for cruises with P&O, plus another £1,800 on holidays, including trips on the Eurostar and to a four-star hotel in Corfu.
He also spent £1,275 on new carpets for his home and more than £100 on tickets for shows at Manchester’s Royal Exchange Theatre.
The overall fraud totalled more than £180,000, but Flowers had submitted a basis of plea, accepted by prosecutors, in which he admitted just under £100,000 worth of fraudulent activity.
In July, Flowers, 74, pleaded guilty to a catalogue of fraud amounting to nearly £100,000, relating to his abuse of position as the executor of the will and holder of power of attorney for a woman named Margaret Jarvis
He admitted swindling a female friend of around £100,000 to pay for wine, luxury holidays abroad and trips to the theatre (pictured on October 4, 2023)
In court today, Judge Dean noted the defendant had ‘fragile mental health’ but that an immediate custodial sentence could be ‘almost inevitable’ for an offence over a sustained period involving a ‘vulnerable victim’, which he said may explain why the defendant had not attended.
Flowers, from Salford, was dubbed the ‘Crystal Methodist’ after the Mail on Sunday published secretly filmed footage of the then-church minister handing over £300 in cash for crystal meth and other drugs in Leeds in November 2013.
Earlier that year, Flowers had stood down as chairman of the Co-Operative Bank, a post he had held for more than three years, after a £1.5 billion black hole was discovered in its finances.
The former Labour councillor in Rochdale and Bradford was later banned from the financial services industry after the City watchdog found he demonstrated the ‘lack of fitness and propriety required’ to work in the sector.
The Financial Conduct Authority concluded he used his work mobile telephone to make a number of inappropriate telephone calls to a premium-rate chat line and he used his work email account to send and receive sexually explicit and otherwise inappropriate messages, and to discuss illegal drugs.
Flowers, pictured giving evidence to MPs in 2013, was forced to step down from his role at the Co-op after a £1.5 billion black hole was discovered in its finances
The former Co-op boss, from Salford, was dubbed the ‘Crystal Methodist’ after the Mail on Sunday published secretly filmed footage of the then-church minister handing over £300 in cash for crystal meth and other drugs in Leeds in November 2013
In May 2014, Flowers was fined £525 after pleading guilty to possession of cocaine, crystal meth and ketamine at Leeds magistrates’ court.
The court heard the ‘stress’ of his Co-op job and ‘caring for his terminally ill mother’ were reasons for his drug use.
He was later caught on video snorting cocaine and entertaining rent boys at his home in Salford, Greater Manchester.
Flowers, who was sacked as a Methodist minister in December 2016, discussed his seedy lifestyle in an interview with the BBC’s Newsnight, admitting: ‘I have sinned.’
Later, it emerged that he had resigned from Bradford Council in 2011 when ‘inappropriate but not illegal’ pornography was discovered on his laptop.