A Slough men’s hockey captain has been jailed for fraud offences after swindling over £3m from family and friends to fund his gambling addiction.
Inder Daggar, 32, was jailed for six years and five months at Reading Crown Court on Jan 6 after he admitted to a fraudulent investment scheme.
It is a considerable fall from grace after Daggar had led Slough men in 2021 to their highest league position since 1992.
With Daggar as captain, the club then played their opening match of the South Central Premier League against Henley, as Slough also celebrated their 100th anniversary.
However, his trial told a different story off the pitch, with the court hearing how Daggar scammed victims, which included members of Slough HC, after losing millions from his gambling problems.
His club told The Hockey Paper that Daggar has been handed a lifetime ban.
“The fraudulent, deceptive and harrowing behaviour conducted by one individual at the cost of multiple members both at our club and within our wider hockey community, has been both devastating and abhorrent,” the club said in a statement.
“While no legal outcome can fully repair the damage caused by his despicable actions, this sentencing is a step towards closure for the victims.
“We’d like to thank all those that were involved in all efforts to help the authorities deliver justice.”
Following a Thames Valley Police investigation, between 2019 and 2021 Daggar approached people telling them he was starting his own company.
He produced glossy brochures and told people that he intended to tender for projects with large businesses such as PepsiCo, Mars and Nestle.
He and the investor would sign contracts which said that the capital invested would sit in the company bank account so that he could show the large businesses that he had enough money to do the work.
When money was due to be returned, Dagger asked investors to keep it in the business as he had more work coming or would tell them there were problems with the bank.
In reality, the investments would swiftly be moved to one of his many other accounts and gambled away.
Daggar would produce fake e-mails, invoices and bank statements to convince his victims that his business was genuine.
The financial loss of the victims was in the region of £3.2 million. Daggar’s net earnings were around £40,000 and nowhere near the amount gambled.
He gambled with around 53 different gambling companies. The most bets placed by Daggar in one day was 1,333 and the biggest financial loss, due to gambling, in one day was £125,000.
The sentencing judge, Neil Millard, said this outlay was “quite frankly astonishing”, while the court also heard how Daggar’s investment business led to some victims losing life savings.
