Overview
- Seven defendants, five men and two women, are on trial charged with conspiracy to defraud over an alleged ticketing scheme tied to Liverpool FC matches.
- Prosecutors say more than 1,000 club memberships were created or misused with bogus details to obtain tickets later resold at marked-up prices on Viagogo, StubHub and Ticketbis.
- Evidence outlined in court includes a phone seized from staffer Louis James containing nearly 250,000 messages and 27,000 images that prosecutors say document day-to-day ticket coordination, including with Joseph Johnson.
- An internal system revamp in February 2018 flagged £9 local tickets processed before public sale, repeated use of the password “Luis7,” patterned email addresses, and transactions traced to the Crowne Plaza hotel on Princes Dock.
- The court heard that employees Louis James and James Johnson worked in the ticket office during the period and that messages from 2015–2016 discussed profits from multiple membership cards, with activity later extending to other Premier League games.