Raedex Consortium

The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) is investigating suspected fraud in relation to the activities of the Raedex Consortium, including the companies Buy2Let Cars, PayGo Cars, Raedex trading as Wheels4Sure and Rent2Own Cars, in the period 2012 to 2021.

Operating for nine years, the company offered car leasing schemes where investors were given the chance to invest in cars which would be leased out.

The SFO’s investigation – first announced in April 2021 – has heard from hundreds of investors and involved interviewing and searching the homes of former company directors Reginald Larry-Cole and Scott Martin. Mr Larry-Cole was later arrested and released on conditional bail in October 2021, after he was assessed to be at risk of leaving the jurisdiction.

On 19^th January 2024, the SFO charged both Mr Larry-Cole and Mr Martin each with three counts of fraud in relation to the scheme.

On 29 February 2024, Reginald Larry-Cole and Scott Martin appeared at Southwark Crown Court for a Plea and Trial Preparation Hearing in relation to three counts of fraud. A trial has been listed for 14 September 2026 and in due course, the SFO will be in contact with individuals who have provided a witness statement in this matter.

Investor updates

Charging Update – 2 February 2024

On 1 February 2024, the former company directors Reginald Larry-Cole and Scott Martin appeared at Westminster Magistrates’ Court.  They have been released on conditional bail to appear before Southwark Crown Court on 29 February 2024.

If you are an investor who has not previously completed a questionnaire, but would like to provide information, please contact the case team on [email protected] and we can send a questionnaire to you.

If you have already completed the questionnaire, please do not forget to update us if your contact details have changed.

19 January 2024

What will happen next

The defendants are required to appear at a hearing at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on February 1 2024 to answer the charges. 

Help and support

We recognise that you may have been affected financially and possibly in other ways by these circumstances. Our information sheet provides details of organisations who provide support services to victims of crime and information on financial advice. If you would like our Victim and Witness care team to refer you to your local Police and Crime Commissioner funded victim support service please email our Victim and Witness Care Team on [email protected]

Next steps

We will put any further updates on this page and would ask that you check here for further information on the progress on the case. Updates to the investigation by the Financial Services Investigation Services (FSCS) into the Raedex Consortium can be found here.

18 October 2023 – Our investigation in relation to the activities of the Raedex Consortium is still ongoing.

Investors should read the information contained in our updates below regarding “phishing” emails, retention of documents and support information. We would also remind investors who completed a questionnaire to update us if your contact details change or have changed since you completed a questionnaire.

As this is a live investigation, the SFO can provide no further comment at this time.

27 June 2023 – The investigation in relation to the activities of the Raedex Consortium is still ongoing. 

Contact Details
Please do not forget to update us on [email protected], if your contact details change or have changed since you completed a questionnaire.

9 March 2023 – The review of investors’ statements is ongoing and we may contact further investors at a later stage. As mentioned previously, due to the number of investors, we will only contact a sample of those who invested for us to evidence how the scheme operated.

23 November 2022 – We have now contacted all those investors from whom we wish to obtain a statement, this is an ongoing review and we may contact further investors at a later stage. As mentioned previously, due to the number of investors, we will only contact a sample of those who invested for us to evidence how the scheme operated.

If you are an investor who is yet to complete a questionnaire, then please contact us on [email protected] and we will send you one to complete.

“Phishing” emails

We have been made aware that some investors might have received emails seeking for them to provide personal information in relation to an investigation into Raedex Consortium. The SFO would like to draw your attention to the following advice Phishing: Spot and report scam emails, texts, websites and… – NCSC.GOV.UK. The SFO will never ask for any personal information to be provided over email and will always use our secure platform Egress. Please be mindful on the source of any emails and only respond if you know the sender.

19 August 2022 – We have contacted all those investors from whom we wish to obtain a statement, this is an ongoing review and we may contact further investors at a later stage. As mentioned previously, due to the number of investors, we will only contact a sample of those who invested for us to evidence how the scheme operated.

19 May 2022 – We have now identified a proportion of investors from whom we will obtain witness statements.  As mentioned previously, due to the number of investors, we will only contact a sample of those who invested for us to evidence how the scheme operated. We have been contacting, or will contact those investors from whom we wish to obtain a witness statement.

Support information for investor victims

If you would like some help and support our Information Sheet lists organisations that can offer support to victims of crime and organisations that can offer advice on financial matters. 

22 February 2022 – Thank you to all those investors who have responded to the questionnaire, we have collated the responses and are now reviewing the information. 

We will now start to contact some investors to obtain witness statements from them explaining the events that occurred. Due to the number of investors, we will only contact a sample of those who invested for us to evidence how the scheme operated. All the investor information will be collated into the evidential material but it is not necessary or proportionate for us to obtain a statement from everyone that invested.

The Serious Fraud Office is committed to supporting victims of fraud, and we invite those who believe they have been a victim in connection with this investigation to check this page for updates and for information on the support services we provide.

28 January 2022 – The SFO would like to thank investors who have provided information about their investments so far. The investigation into Raedex is ongoing and being progressed; we cannot provide any further information on a live investigation. Please retain any correspondence and documents you hold in respect of your investment. 

Due to ongoing problems with the questionnaire we ask that any investor, that has not yet completed the questionnaire to date, to contact the case team by 21 February 2022 on [email protected]. A member of the case team will then send you by secure email an Excel version of the questionnaire to complete, with instructions for returning.

Should you have any queries or require assistance completing our questionnaire, please contact our dedicated Support Officer, Renu Thacker by email at [email protected] or, if you wish to contact us by telephone, contact Renu on 020 7084 4859 on Tuesdays or Thursdays.

Retention of Documents

Investors in Raedex should advise the SFO if they have any documents relating to their investment. This includes any documents or correspondence held in an electronic format, for example emails. Please do not dispose of or destroy any of this information as we may wish to consider it for the purposes of our investigation.

Contact Details

Please do not forget to update us if your contact details change or have changed since you completed a questionnaire.

22 December 2021 – The technical issues experienced by some investors with the questionnaire are now resolved. We thank investors for bearing with us while we looked into these issues.

Frequently asked questions for investors

Browsers and devices

This secure questionnaire will work with commonly supported up-to-date browsers and devices. If you have issues with the device or browser you are using, please try a different device and/or browser.

Issues submitting the questionnaire

Should you still experience issues submitting the questionnaire please double check the following:

• All questions have been completed
• Any questions requiring figures only do not contain symbols such as ‘£’
• Contact number contains the country code e.g. UK country code is +44.

If you still have trouble submitting the questionnaire, please email Renu Thacker on [email protected], with details of the issues you are experiencing.

Please note that once started you will need to complete the questionnaire all in one go. You will not be able to save and return to it.  Therefore, it may be helpful to have all your relevant Raedex documents on hand for reference before starting.

30 November 2021 – We are aware that some investors are currently experiencing technical issues with the questionnaire which we are looking into and hope to resolve very soon.  We will update the website when the issues have been resolved.  We thank investors for their patience and bearing with us in the meantime. If you have any queries regarding completion of this form, please contact Renu Thacker by email on [email protected]. 

20 October 2021 – The SFO asked investors into the suspected fraudulent schemes to complete a confidential questionnaire by 7 January 2022. The information provided will help the SFO to continue to progress the investigation. The questionnaire can be accessed here.

On this day, the SFO also arrested and interviewed a suspect.