A COUPLE serving prison sentences for their role in a £110m fraud have been told they face an extra four years’ jail unless they repay almost £1.5m within six months.

Warwick Crown Court heard David and Elizabeth Liversidge, of Constable Burton, near Leyburn, North Yorkshire, were given a five per cent payment by manufacturer Max Fraser for 900 bogus invoices for machinery from their industrial oven company.

Fraser, who ran a factory in Leicester, used the invoices between 2001 and 2007 to persuade 20 banks, including Barclays and the Bank of Scotland, to obtain loans.

Neighbours of Liversidge, 66, and his 60-year-old wife said they were stunned after the couple were found guilty of conspiracy to commit false accounting after a six-week trial in 2011.

They were jailed for five and three years, respectively, while Fraser was jailed for eight years.

The Proceeds of Crime Act confiscation hearing was told the couple, who have been married for more than 40 years, had been paid £5m for the scam, which resulted in hundreds of people losing their jobs.

The couple used to money to fund a luxury lifestyle and bought a £1.25m five-bedroom converted barn on the edge of the Yorkshire Dales village in cash and another house in Leyburn.

The Liversidges, who had joined a campaign to improve road safety in the village after moving there in 2007, have been attempting to sell the Constable Burton property since 2011 and the asking price is now £690,000.

However, after an extensive police investigation into their assets, David Liversidge was told to hand over £754,540, while his wife was ordered to repay assets worth £738,204.

They were told they would serve an additional four years in jail if the funds were not repaid by January.

The money will be handed to the victims of the fraud.

Paul Wenlock, of Leicestershire Police’s economic crime unit, said: “This hearing is the final step in an investigation which has resulted in substantial sentences, and now substantial asset seizures.

“I hope the message goes out to anyone tempted to fund a living out of crime.

“We will pursue you through the criminal courts and then we will take steps to deprive you of the profits of your crime.”