A BRITISH bank manager who committed suicide last year due to 'work-related stress' is believed to have helped to stash the multi-millions in image rights earned by Barça FC footballer Lionel Messi.
The firm of which 62-year-old David Waygood, from Kemsing in Kent, UK, was sole director is said to be among several companies outside of Spain where the Argentinian player's money was hidden, according to reports in British tabloids The Mirror and The Daily Mail, as well as local press in the Kent area.
Some 3.75 million euros were reportedly placed in 'front' companies in the UK, Belice, Switzerland and Uruguay to avoid paying taxes in Spain.
Mr Waygood's firm is said to have held shares in a nominee company in the UK, whereby the nominees own or control the company on another party's behalf based upon agreements between both which are top-secret.
A former HSBC and NatWest employee who lived on Sherborne Grove in Kemsing, David Waygood left a suicide note last year for his adult children James – who had been staying with his father due concerns about his welfare - and Lizzie, and then threw himself under a train in Otford (county of Kent, UK) on April 27.
His company was facing investigation by the Financial Conduct Authority, and the stress of this is thought to have been the last straw.
A coroner confirmed Mr Waygood's death was caused by suicide after an inquest six months later in Tunbridge Wells.
Suicidal businessman 'in treatment and counselling'
He was seen by the driver of the 08.32hrs from Sevenoaks to Blackfriars, standing on a footpath near the crossing on the famous Pilgrim's Way immortalised in The Canterbury Tales, a few metres back from the track.
The depressed banker stepped onto the track and stood facing the train head-on with his hands held up as the driver sounded the horn, according to Mr Waygood's local newspaper, The Sevenoaks Chronicle.
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