AN ACCOUNTANT conned his millionaire friends of out of £186,000 by writing himself company cheques to pay off his bills, a court heard.

Adrian Lummis is accused of three counts of fraud by abuse of position, which he denies.

Self-employed Lummis was in charge of the business and personal accounts for brothers Douglas and James Edwards, who he has worked with for almost 30 years.

It is alleged he got the scrap dealers to sign blank company cheques for one of their businesses, Nationwide Metal Recycling Ltd in Ardleigh, and then used them for his personal gain.

Lummis is accused of acting against the interests of the company by taking £20,000 to pay for his own solicitor’s conveyancing bill in December 2011.

The 53-year-old, of The Street, Diss, is accused of doing the same in March the following year, this time for £41,697.30, to pay his own taxes to Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs.

And then a third fraud totalling a mammoth £125,000 in July, 2012, also to pay off his taxes.

Lummis claimed the brothers agreed to him having the money as interest free loans and he has repaid it all, after he inherited a substantial amount when his estranged wife died.

He claims the brothers are lying because they are angry at him for his incompetence after he failed to file tax returns properly forcing them to pay off hundreds of thousands of pounds in late payments and fines to HMRC.

Hugh Vass, prosecuting at Ipswich Crown Court yesterday, said: “He was trusted implicitly to act honestly.

“In 2011 the turnover of NMR reached levels which required them to appoint auditors.”

The court heard, in April 2014, the auditors uncovered a number of problems with the brothers’ taxes and the cheques came to light.

By November Lummis had repaid the money to the firm, based just off the A12.

Mr Vass told the court Lummis is not on trial for being an “incompetent” accountant but for fraudulently taking the money.

Douglas Edwards told the court: “We completely trusted him.”

He said when they sold one business in 2005 for £16million they gave him a £100,000 bonus, he went on a family skiing holiday with them and was a good friend.

He added the idea they had given the money as loans was “complete nonsense”.

The court heard Douglas Edwards had to pay about £400,000 in late payments and fines for tax mistakes by Lummis and NMR had to pay another about £200,000.

NMR now has a turnover of about £20million per year and, at the time of the money being taken, was making about £1million operating profit each year.

Mr Edwards said: “If he had asked me to lend him some money I would have done, but he didn’t.”

He said the auditors found the three cheques and he confronted Lummis when the third cheque, for £125,000 emerged.

Christopher Kerr, defending, said: “He made a complete mess of the accounts.

“As these matters came out you must have been absolutely furious with him.”

Douglas Edwards said: “That is what you pay an accountant to do.

“There was £186,000 which was supposed to go to our corporation tax that went to him.”

He dismissed claims he was denying giving Lummis loans because he was angry at the fines.

He said he was denying the cheques were agreed loans because they were not.

The brothers are also taking civil proceedings against Lummis for £350,000 claiming his incompetence led to them facing huge fines for tax errors and great expense by getting other accountants in to solve the problems Lummis allegedly caused

Douglas and James Edwards are also property investors in Colchester having invested about £2million in student accommodation around the Hythe.

The trial continues.