Tea fraudster claimed he'd invented the ‘Bag for Life'
Thomas Robinson made more than £550,000 by tricking customers such as Fortnum & Mason and Edinburgh's Balmoral Hotel into buying 'Scottish-grown tea' that was actually from abroad.
He also conned aspiring tea growers by selling them plants he claimed had been 'specially engineered' to grow in Scotland's climate – but in reality they had been bought in from Italy.
The 55-year-old, who was known to his many customers as Tam O'Braan, spun an elaborate back story claiming among other things that he was a former bomb-disposal expert, had lived in the Amazon and sold tea to customers including Kensington Palace.
He also lied about inventing the ' bag for life ', a recycling initiative pioneered by Waitrose in the late 1990s.
'Hubris and arrogance'
Robinson, a father-of-four, of Dalreoch Farm, Amulree, Perthshire, was sentenced to three-and-a-half years in jail at Stirling sheriff court via video link with Low Moss Prison, where Robinson is being held.
He denied defrauding tea growers, hotels and tea companies between 2014 and 2019, claiming that paperwork he could have used in his defence had been destroyed in a flood and his electronic records wiped.
Robinson added: 'I've time to wrestle with this over sleepless nights in my cell. Hubris and arrogance led me to believe I did my best.
'I hope my actions have not detracted from the truthful success that can be achieved for people who want to grow tea in Scotland.'
The court heard that Robinson ordered tea plants from a nursery in Sussex called 'Plants4Presents' and planted them in the kitchen garden of a rented former sheep farm near Loch Tay.
Robinson claimed to have found a way to make his tea flourish in Scotland using a 'special biodegradable polymer', which prosecutors said resembled black bin liner.
He said he had given a presentation on his methods to the Royal Horticultural Society, and began supplying Edinburgh's Balmoral Hotel with what he described as authentically Scottish single-estate tea.
The tea menu at the Balmoral's Palm Court, based on his descriptions, boasted: 'Our Scottish grown teas come from gardens in our farming heartlands in Perthshire and Dumfries and Galloway.'
They had names such as 'Dalreoch White', 'Silver Needles', 'Scottish Antlers Tea', and 'Highland Green'.
'Not a victimless crime'
Robinson secured deals to supply single-estate Scottish-grown tea products from his own plants and other tea gardens but in reality he bought over a ton of tea grown abroad that was repackaged and sold on.
The court heard a kilo of African tea could be sold for 100 times its cost if passed as grown in Scotland.
The scam began to unravel early in 2017 when Perth and Kinross council checked on whether he had a food processing licence and Food Standards Scotland launched an investigation.
Robinson was told by Keith O'Mahony, the sheriff, that he had carried out a fraud using 'significant, determined and sometimes complex planning'. Imposing the jail sentence, Mr O'Mahony said he wanted to emphasise that Robinson's crimes were 'not victimless'.
He said: 'Witness after witness gave evidence that they would not have transacted with [Robinson] had they known the true position regarding the providence of the plants and the tea leaves.
'Numerous individuals keen to develop a possible tea-growing occupation were persuaded by him on the basis of false pretences to hand over significant sums of money. For all these reasons the only appropriate disposal is a custodial one.'
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