Discovery of the fraud in 2023 led to the grounding of planes in the UK and around the world so that engines could be checked and parts replaced where necessary.
Among the carriers affected were Ryanair, American Airlines, Ethiopian Airlines and TAP Air Portugal. Overall losses were estimated at £39.3m, according to the SFO.
The production and sale of aircraft parts is heavily regulated. So called Authorised Release Certificates (ARCs) are used as proof that critical new or refurbished parts are airworthy.
But the ARCs used by Zamora Yrala were falsified, the court heard.
Some of them were genuine certificates supplied by an accomplice working as a technician at an airline, but with details altered on his home computer. Others were forgeries created with the help of a Spanish graphic designer.
Prosecutors said Zamora Yrala also produced fake documents which purported to show where AOG Technics had obtained the parts from.
He also invented fake employees, with customers receiving emails and documents signed by a range of fabricated sales managers and quality managers, as part of creating an illusion of a legitimate business, the SFO said.
In fact only Zamora Yrala himself, his then wife, her brother and the family’s nanny were ever on the payroll, the court heard.
The fraud led to some 60,000 suspect engine parts entering the global aviation supply chain, sold by AOG for nearly £7 million.
The origin of those parts remains unknown.
“It is almost impossible to identify where parts sold with forged certificates came from”, explained Harriet Sassoon, case controller at the SFO.
Alongside his jail sentence, Zamora Yrala was disqualified from acting as a company director for eight years. He will face proceeds of crime proceedings later this year.
A related investigation, carried out by the Portuguese authorities, is still going on.