Jockey Roche fined for under-declaration of income tax

Derby winner Christy Roche has become the second racehorse trainer this year named and shamed over unpaid taxes.

The Kildare-based national hunt boss has been hit with a bill for €165,468 after an investigation by the Revenue Commissioners.

In September it was confirmed that champion Irish horse trainer Aidan O’Brien had been sent a bill for more than €500,00 for unpaid tax.

Roche (aged 62) of Curragh View House in Co Kildare, who won the Irish Derby as a jockey in 1982, 1992 and 1997 and famously the Epsom Derby on Secreto in 1984, has been fined over under-declaration of income tax and as part of the Revenue Offshore Assets investigations.

His name was on the Revenue’s Defaulters’ List after being ordered to pay €70,494 in tax and €94,974 in interest and penalties.

Roche retired from the saddle in August 1998 after an illustrious 30-year career and now trains horses almost exclusively for his chief patron JP McManus.

A total of 84 taxpayers and businesses were on the Defaulters’ List with unpaid taxes and penalties totalling €18.95m. Forty were for amounts more than €100,000, of which eight were over €500,000 and four of those exceeded €1m.

Revenue said two settlements worth €580,000 were linked to bogus non-resident account holders, 14 worth €6.49m involved offshore funds, and four settlements of €790,000 were linked to the inquiry into single premium insurance products.

Mullingar Travel on Austin Friar Street in Mullingar in Co Westmeath made the largest payment in the list, totalling just more than €1.9m.

Sports Division based in Unit 403 in the Blanchardstown Centre in Dublin made the second largest settlement, of more than €1.6m.