Harry Redknapp cleared of tax dodge (From Croydon Guardian)

Harry Redknapp cleared of tax dodge

11:51am Wednesday 8th February 2012 in National News © Press Association 2011

Harry Redknapp has been cleared of taking bungs in an offshore tax dodge.

Bookmakers immediately slashed the odds on the Tottenham Hotspur manager becoming the next England boss as a five year long "nightmare" ended for the one of football's biggest names.

Jurors accepted Redknapp's angry denials that he avoided tax on any payments over £189,000 found in a Monaco account.

His acquittal alongside co-defendant Milan Mandaric blows the final whistle on an £8 million police investigation which failed to yield a single conviction.

Mandaric and former Portsmouth FC chief executive Peter Storrie were also cleared of £600,000 tax dodge charges at a previous trial, it can be reported for the first time.

Redknapp and Mandaric hugged as the jury cleared them on all counts.

Outside London's Southwark Crown Court, Redknapp, flanked by son his Jamie, said: "It really has been a nightmare, I've got to be honest. It's been five years and this is a case that should never have come to court because it's unbelievable really. It was horrendous you know but it was a unanimous decision. The jury were absolutely unanimous that there was no case to answer."

Mandaric told reporters: "I've got to go somewhere to try to pinch myself and wake me up from that horrible dream that I had in the past. As we said in the statements, I always believed in the truth, and always believed in the British justice system."

But jurors accepted Redknapp and Mandaric's evidence that the Monaco account in the name of Redknapp's dog, Rosie, was nothing to do with footballing matters.

The verdicts mark a disastrous end of an exhaustive inquiry into football corruption by the tax authorities and City of London Police.