It’s not uncommon to hear about record labels ripping off bands by failing to pay royalties or using other kinds of financial trickery.
But it’s not every day you hear about the labels themselves being on the receiving end, with a UK executive today admitting to the theft of over $1 Million over 10 years.
Duncan Schwier, 52, told the Hammersmith Magistrates Court in the UK that over the course of a decade he had swindled the world’s largest music label with scores of invoices from non-existent companies.
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According to the Daily Mail, Schwier has been employed by Universal Music since 1984 and worked his way up to their head of production. He probably would have got away with the crime if it wasn’t for a promotion he received in 2013.
“What has happened in this situation is that Mr Schwier was employed by Universal Music as head of production,” said prosecutor Caroline Mungal.
“He was promoted in early 2013,” she continued. “Mr Schwier moved and his replacement was a person by the name of John Clifford. He noticed there was something strange about some of the transactions.”
“It was discovered that in fact there were a large number for fraudulent transactions.” The fraud amounted to £643,697.35, the court was told.
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Schwier has blamed the theft on a ‘series’ of cancers. “The background for this is a series of cancers for which I have medical reports,” he told the court while entering a guilty plea.
He was released on unconditional bail ahead of sentence at Isleworth Crown Court on 30 September.
The music industry is rife with stories of scams and con-artists ripping both the industry, fans, and bands alike.
Just last year, an aspiring Californian rock star managed to defraud millions of dollars from banks in his quest to be famous, spending the money on lavish holidays and wasting $750k on a fancy tour bus shaped like an airplane.
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Closer to home, some messy developments have led to an Australian booking and touring agency allegedly shutting down operations after it was accused that its founder was deceiving artists, staff, and the music industry at large with an alias to avoid being linked to a series of unpaid debts and music festival flops.
A man by the name of Harrison O’Connor aka ‘Harry’ is listed as the founder of Paramount Agency & Touring, a Sydney-based company that sprang up this July, but O’Connor is believed to in fact be one Dene Broadbelt (aka Dene Mussillon/Musillon/Morgan according to different sources), the same promoter responsible for a Goulbourn radio station festival that left musicians out of pocket and a “scam” Darwin festival called Infinity.
