Cork-born financier Mr Finbarr Ross has walked free from a Belfast appeals court after his two-and-a-half year prison sentence for deception was quashed.
Mr Ross (54) was convicted last October and sentenced for deception by unlawfully procuring investments in the Gibraltar-based company he founded, International Investments Ltd.
The company went bust in 1983 owing around £7.3 million (€ 9.3 million) to investors, most from Northern Ireland.
The main thrust of Mr Ross's appeal was a submission by Mr Arthur Harvey, QC, that the trial judge, Lord Justice McCollum, in his charge to the jury "was so unbalanced as to be unfair".
