A major shareholder of English football club Birmingham City has been convicted of money laundering.

Carson Yeung Ka-sing, a large shareholder of English football club Birmingham City, has been found guilty in a Hong Kong court of laundering HK$721 million using five Hong Kong bank accounts, according to the South China Morning Post.

Yeung was described by the District Court Judge Douglas Yau Tak-hong as “not a witness of truth”, who had lied and exaggerated his income. He found Yeung’s testimony was self-contradictory and some of it was even “extremely strange”, the publication said.

The report said “huge amounts of money” went through five accounts in Yeung’s name or of which he was a signatory at Wing Lung Bank and HSBC between January 2001 and December 2007. The judge noted that the accounts were used as a repository fund as deposits and withdrawals of the accounts were almost identical.

The judge found that a right thinking member of the community would have reasonable grounds to believe the money dealt with by the bank accounts represent wholly or in part, directly or indirectly, proceeds from an indictable offence.

The judge said many of the deposits were cash deposits because Yeung, 54, knew that would make the money more difficult to trace.

Graham Harris, Yeung’s lawyer said that in light of the verdict “an immediate custodial sentence is inevitable”, the report said. “We will not be asking for bail,” he said.

Mitigation and sentencing has been adjourned to this Friday.