Mark Rowe and Nicola Rowe are now facing justice

08:34, 17 Oct 2025Updated 09:14, 17 Oct 2025

Mark Rowe and Nicola Rowe outside a private jet

A conman splashed out £31,500 on an LS Lowry sketch and a luxury life in Tenerife using money stolen from a holiday investment scam that fleeced more than 3,000 people out of £28m.

The conspiracy, masterminded by Mark Rowe, 54, operated under the brand Sell My Timeshare (SMT), with his wife, Nicola, serving as the company’s finance director.

The firm preyed on owners desperate to offload their properties. Investigators revealed Mark Rowe ‘put victims up in hotels’ and ‘created fake virtual offices and fake personas’ as part of the fraud, with 14 people eventually convicted of various offences under Operation Destin.

After being enticed to meetings at SMT’s Bournemouth, York, Stratford-upon-Avon or Tenerife-based offices under the guise of selling their timeshares, victims instead ‘endured high-pressure sales meetings, which often lasted up to six hours’, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said.

The meetings saw victims pressured to trade in their timeshares and make an additional payment for the company’s ‘Monster Credits’ scheme, which promised discounts on holidays and shopping, as well as the opportunity to trade them with other customers on a dedicated platform.

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In many cases, victims took out loans to purchase the credits, typically investing around £8,000, the CPS said. Victims would later discover that not only were the credits worthless, but in most cases, they still owned and incurred the costs of their timeshares.

In total, 3,583 victims across the UK were defrauded out of £28.1m, with the highest individual loss being £80,000. Investigators have revealed that nearly 500 victims, most of whom were aged between 60 and 80, with some in their 90s, lost more than £10,000 each.

‘A lot of the money was spent on luxury’

Senior investigating officer Peter Highway highlighted that a ‘lot of the money was spent on luxury’ by managing director Rowe and Nicola Rowe, 54, who served as the company’s finance director, reports Yorkshire Live.

The investigation found that the Rowes splashed out over £110,000 on private school fees, a Hampshire house with stables valued at £2.4m, and even £26,000 on a single private jet trip to Tenerife. It was also disclosed that £8m was funnelled into Mark and Nicola Rowe’s personal account, with £185,000 being lavished at art galleries including £31,500 for a pencil sketch by LS Lowry.

Nicola Rowe and Mark Rowe

Rowe, of Los Blanquitos in Tenerife, was sentenced in January to seven-and-a-half years’ imprisonment after being convicted of conspiracy to defraud. His wife, also living in Los Blanquitos in Tenerife, is set to be sentenced on Friday at Southwark Crown Court after admitting to money laundering.

In total, 14 individuals were convicted following four trials spanning two years at Southwark Crown Court – with reporting restrictions lifted only after Nicola Rowe’s guilty plea.

During one of the trials, a victim impact statement was read out in court, where a victim said: “I’m now supposed to be retired and enjoying life, but as a result of being a victim of Mark Rowe’s fraud my quality of life has been reduced to a struggle – I’m unable to afford to even pay my own rent.

A screengrab from Nicola Rowe’s Facebook page showing the private jet the couple used

“I’ve been a successful businessman all of my life, but feel that I’ve let my wife down, and I cannot see how I can put this right in the time that we have left.”

Mr Highway, from the South West Regional Organised Crime Unit which spearheaded the six-year investigation, stated: “The fact so many people were defrauded in this case reflects the lengths Mark Rowe went to both to lure victims to meetings with his criminal sales team and continually invent new methods to deceive them.

“He paid for TV and magazine ads, put victims up in hotels, and even created fake virtual offices and fake personas.”

CPS specialist prosecutor Gayle Ramsey described it as ‘a living nightmare’ for the victims.

“These defendants acted in a completely selfish and manipulative manner to make huge sums for themselves and exploited timeshare owners, many of whom were elderly,” she said.

The Lowry sketch(Image: PA)

“They provided victims with the false hope of disposing of timeshares in exchange for a valuable investment when in reality they were each left tens of thousands of pounds out of pocket after purchasing something which was worthless.”

Ms Ramsey added the CPS would seek to pursue any money or assets gained by the defendants through their offending via its proceeds of crime division.

Number of people convicted

Following the initial trial from October 2023 to October of the previous year, a number of individuals were convicted of conspiracy to defraud.

This includes Jodi Beard, 43, from El Roque, Tenerife, who received a two-year suspended sentence, and Paul Harrison, 55, from Weymouth, who was handed a four-and-a-half-year prison term.

The people involved in part of the conspiracy of a holiday investment scam. Pictured, from left to right, Mark Rowe, Joanne Taylor, Joanne Physick, Samantha Macaulay. Middle row, from left, Simon Walker, Nihat Paul Salih, Jodi Beard and Paul Harrison. Bottom row, from left, Nicola Rowe, Barrie Fox, Lee Evans and Lisa Salih(Image: South West Regional Organised Crime Unit )

Also convicted of conspiracy to defraud were Nihat Paul Salih, 57, and Lisa Salih, 56, both from Poole, Dorset. Salih was sentenced to three years in prison, while Mrs Salih received a two-year suspended sentence.

Samantha Macaulay, 52, a credits administrator from San Miguel De Abona, Tenerife, was given an 18-month suspended sentence after being found guilty of fraud by false representation. However, she was acquitted of conspiracy to defraud.

In the second trial, which ran from October of the previous year until February, Simon Walker, 58, from Costa Adeje in Tenerife, was sentenced to four-and-a-half years in prison. Joanne Physick, 46, from Los Christianos Arona, Tenerife, received a two-and-a-half-year prison term after being found guilty of conspiracy to defraud.

Offices in Tenerife(Image: PA)

Following the third trial in June and July, David Taylor, 65, from East Yorkshire, was handed an immediate three-year prison sentence.

Joanne Taylor, 53, from East Yorkshire, and Lee Evans, 51, from Preston, both admitted to fraud by false representation and were handed suspended sentences of 12 months and two years respectively.

Two ‘senior client advisers’, Barrie Fox, 69, and Josephine Cuthill-Fox, 60, both from Worcester, also pleaded guilty to the same charge and are due to be sentenced on Friday.