Former Deutsche banker, accountant jailed in UK's biggest insider dealing case

A former Deutsche Bank managing director was sentenced to four-and-a-half years in jail for insider dealing by a London court on Thursday as Britain's biggest market abuse investigation drew to a close.

Martyn Dodgson, a 44-year-old banker who advised the government during the credit crisis, was handed the longest UK prison term for the crime to date for his part in a scam that prosecutors said made over $10 million between 2006 and 2010.

Accountant Andrew Hind, a 56-year-old former finance director of fashion chain Topshop, was sentenced to three-and-a-half years for the same crime at London's Southwark Crown Court after the two men were convicted on Monday.

Insider dealing - using confidential information to trade on the stockmarket - carries a maximum seven-year sentence in the UK. But the longest prison term to date had been four years.

The sentences draw a line under Operation Tabernula, an eight-and-a-half year Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) inquiry sparked by a 2007 alert after two day traders "attacked" brewing group Scottish & Newcastle in what the FCA case team has called "no holds barred, high-risk trading".

This led to mass police raids and arrests three years later that sent shockwaves through the City of London. It culminated in three guilty pleas and, on Monday, two convictions and three acquittals after a near four-month trial.