JAKARTA - A married couple from Norfolk, England, who were proven to be behind a large-scale concert ticket scam, are now on the ropes after the court ordered them to return £3 million or around Rp60 billion.
Maria Chenery-Woods and her husband, Mark Woods, are required to pay the nominal amount within three months, otherwise they do not want to spend more time behind bars.
This ruling is a continuation of a case that shook the British entertainment industry, in which their company, TQ Tickets Ltd, illegally bought tickets for top musicians, such as Ed Sheeran and Lady Gaga, to then resell them at exorbitant prices.
At Leeds Crown Court, Chenery-Woods was ordered to pay £995,279 within weeks, with the threat of an additional four-year jail term if he failed to pay.
Meanwhile, Mark Woods is ordered to pay 2 million pounds, by April at the latest, or face the consequences of a prison sentence of seven years and six months.
Previously in May 2024, Chenery-Woods was sentenced to four years in prison, while her husband received a two-year probation sentence, subject to 250 hours of community service and electronic monitoring.
The police who dismantled the case revealed that the total profit earned by the couple reached 9.8 million pounds, an amount that according to legal authorities must be paid in full.
Detective Inspector-in-Chief Jon Hodgeon explained that the financial investigator team had conducted an in-depth analysis of the flow of funds generated by Woods and Chenery-Woods.
He emphasized that the two used dishonest tactics to exploit the public. The modus operandi used was to use dozens of fake identities to buy tickets from official providers such as Ticketmaster, Eventim, and SEE Tickets, then resell them at a much higher price on secondary sites such as Viagogo and Stubhub.
"After the sentence was handed down, our financial investigators intervened and conducted a detailed analysis of the money obtained by Woods and Chenery-Woods," Hodgeon said, quoted by BBS, Monday, January 19.
Meanwhile, Mike Andrews, coordinator of the National Trade Standards Cyber Crime Team, welcomed this decision as good news for music fans around the world.
He stated that the decision showed that crime did not bring profit, because the criminals had to return the huge profits they had made illegally while they continued to face prison terms behind bars.
"This is good news for fans and shows that crime will not pay, as criminals must return the huge profits they make illegally, while they continue to face prison sentences," Andrews said.
In an earlier trial, Ed Sheeran's manager, Stuart Camp, testified about how difficult it was for the management team to prevent scalper practices that harmed loyal fans during a stadium tour in England in 2018.
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