{"id":73610,"date":"2018-01-10T04:04:42","date_gmt":"2018-01-10T11:04:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=73610"},"modified":"2018-01-10T04:04:42","modified_gmt":"2018-01-10T11:04:42","slug":"scandal-emil-savundra-the-prince-of-con-men","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2018\/01\/10\/scandal-emil-savundra-the-prince-of-con-men\/","title":{"rendered":"Scandal, Emil Savundra. The Prince of Con Men"},"content":{"rendered":"

Courtesy ITV<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

“Scandal” was a series of five episodes broadcast weekly on ITV at 10:30pm in July & August 1989.<\/p>\n

The episodes were 1. Tasaday: The Lost Tribe. 2. Bhagwhan Shree Rajneesh: The Man Who Was God. 3. Delorean: The Fast Lane 4. Emil Savundra: The Prince of Con Men. 5. Hollywood Confidential.<\/p>\n

Here we have Episode 4 about the notorious con man “Dr Emil Savundra” Michael Marion Emil Anacletus Pierre Savundranayagam, usually known as Emil Savundra\u00a0(6 July 1923 \u2013 21 December 1976), was a\u00a0Ceylonese\u00a0swindler, most notable for the collapse of his Fire, Auto and Marine Insurance Company, which left about 400,000 UK motorists without cover. As a post-war black marketer, Savundra conducted bribery and fraud on an international scale, before settling in the UK, to sell low-cost insurance to the fast-growing car market. By defaulting on mandatory securities, he was able to fund a lavish lifestyle, mixing in fashionable circles. But this drew the attention of the press, who uncovered evidence of major fraud. In a dramatic TV interview with\u00a0David Frost, he showed contempt for his defrauded customers, some of whom were in the studio audience, and shocked the nation by denying any moral responsibility. As the police had also been investigating him, he was soon arrested and sentenced to eight years’ imprisonment, but released after six, and died two years later, in an advanced state of drug addiction.<\/p>\n