A JUDGE has begun summing up at Chester Crown Court in the case against two businessmen accused of supplying fake sports star autographs.

Judge David Hale is addressing a jury of nine women and three men who will consider allegations that Graeme Walker, 45, owner of Watergate Row-based Sporting Icons Ltd, sold photos and shirts featuring fake signatures.

Co-defendant Faisal Madani, 43, is accused of supplying forgeries to Sporting Icons. Charges have also been laid against Sporting Icons Ltd.

Judge Hale said the accused could use the defence of “due diligence” in relation to the sale of alleged forged signatures if it could be proved they took all reasonable precautions to ensure the items were authentic.

Earlier the court heard how each defendant blames the other.

Paul Lawton, defending, for Walker, said his client had been duped through “an outrageous fraud” perpetrated by Madani who had falsely claimed he was the brother of a former Manchester United director.

“It gives him a licence set up a forging factory selling endless quantities of sporting memorabilia,” said Mr Lawton.

One of Madani’s companies sent footballers on holiday to Dubai in return for which Madani claimed he received hundreds of signatures but players had testified to deny this was the case.

“On the face of it, what’s in it for Mr Madani?” asked Mr Lawton, who added: “It’s all part of the sham isn’t it.”

Mr Lawton argued the forgery operation had been going on long before Graeme Walker met Madani claiming 2,000 signed David Beckham photos had been returned from Japan because they were fake.

He said the “pinnacle of the fraud” was when Madani was invited to Chelsea captain John Terry’s wedding and appeared in a group photo in OK magazine alongside Premiership players “looking like some kind of Middle Eastern oil sheikh”.

He concluded: “The victims of Sporting Icons are the true victims of Faisal Madani.”

Peter Davies, defending, for Madani, began by addressing why his client had chosen not to give evidence in the witness box saying it was his legal right to remain silent. He asked the jury not to trust evidence given by Walker against his client given he had been described as “a crook” by the prosecution.

Mr Davies said his client, who was well connected with football players, was expected to prove “due diligence” but he said the prosecution had failed to meet the same standard in putting its case by failing to call certain witnesses.

“How interesting it would be, after hearing from Michael Owen and Steven Gerrard and Ian Rush, if we heard from Sir Alex Ferguson or Ruud van Nistelrooy to come along and say ‘that’s not my signature’.”

He said hand-writing expert Kim Hughes had compared the questioned autographs – which Mr Davies argued would have been written in haste through a car window – with specimen autographs written with care.

This was “not an adequate basis for comparison”, he argued.

Mr Davies said “practice signatures” for Beckham, Rooney, Gerrard and Sir Alex Ferguson had been found at Walker’s home and shop but not in the possession of his client.

He said signed statements from Madani indicating he had supplied items now the subject of suspicion should not be seen as a confession. While his client may have supplied similar items there was no proof he had supplied the exact items.

“Did he supply them or merely supply items like them which Mr Walker copied to inflate his profits? It’s not a conspiracy, it’s just one man and that man is Mr Walker.”