"It is important to not lose sight of what this fraud is actually about. A large number of innocent people have had to endure the loss of their financial security, with all the loss and heart-break that that brings.
"[This is] a story of dreams crushed, relationships torn apart. Bringing so much misery to the lives of so many."
The court was told heard 344 people were persuaded to invest £5.4mn in the project between May 2013 and January 2015.
Walton Hornsby, prosecuting, said: "The reason the conspiracy came to an end was that in February 2015, the Insolvency Service shut it down, as it was seen to be against the public interest.
"Investors lost all their money. This has been categorised at various points as a boiler room fraud.
"That is not in fact a correct description. It is quite clear that there was a genuine intention to set up a profitable and functioning gold mine in Ecuador, and it was hoped that it would result in investors receiving a substantial increase in the amounts they had invested.
"Over time it was quite clear that this was not a viable investment. Mr Todd was capable of behaving in a domineering if not dictatorial manner in relation to others involved with IPR.
"Mr Todd at this time was capable of being a bully, particularly in relation to Stephen Mayne. He was capable of domineering him, bullying him, and persuading him to do things that were against his better judgement."
The court heard that workers in the gold mine had to be laid off before Christmas 2014. "Having to lay off workers before Christmas, due to lack of funds from England, is a very striking feature in this case.
"Starvation of funds was one of the main reasons it was not profitable.
"So much of the funds from investors were going nowhere near [the mine] but into the pockets of various individuals", the prosecutor continued.
History
Mr Hornsby explained that Todd would never have been authorised to run the scheme by the Financial Conduct Authority because of his past conduct.
"Both (Todd and Mayne) must have been aware that this investment scheme would always have been categorised as a collective investment scheme, and that Mr Todd would never be authorised to run it.
Todd was jailed for seven years for 'carrying on a business with intent to defraud creditors' at Croydon Crown Court in 2018.
A year later he received a consecutive sentence of 12 months imprisonment for a scam involving The Commodities Link Limited, which offered investments in rare earth metals.
