Hemmings was the subject of a police investigation in 2010 and 2011, as a result of which he was charged with fraud, including obtaining money by deception and false representation, in April 2011.

The investigation centred on false invoices that Hemmings had fraudulently created from Ken Biggs Construction in April 2005 and March 2006.

Hemmings, a director of Wiltshire-based academic book printer Cromwell Press from 1991 until it fell into administration for the second time in September 2010, initially denied the charges.

But in July this year he entered a guilty plea, admitting that he had falsified two invoices amounting to £81,983.

Sentencing had been scheduled for 30 August but was delayed to 19 September.