Management at Kyiv’s lucrative Ukraina shopping mall announced it will demand $15 million in compensation that it says was illegally transferred in 2010-2012 by Laryssa Yanez Puga, Ukraina’s former manager, and up to ten of her “close allies,” a press release said.
Two of her alleged
associates, Oleksandr Serpokrylov and Dmytro Zaitsev, have already been found
in contempt by a Belfast, Northern Ireland, court in February, for their role
in stripping the mall’s assets.
They were each
fined 15,000 pounds ($23,000) and were told they would be sentenced to four
weeks in jail if they didn’t pay within six months.
The two Ukrainians
are expected to challenge the Belfast court ruling, BBC Northern Ireland
reported on May 23. They couldn’t be reached for comment.
“The ongoing (illegal)
payments were hidden not only from (the shopping mall’s) shareholders, but also
from judicial bodies,” said Rostyslav Levinzon, Ukraina’s acting director.
“This demonstrates the criminal plans of the group.”
The estimated $78
million Ukraina shopping mall was once part of a $500 million international
property portfolio that belonged to bankrupt ex-billionaire Sean Quinn Sr. and
his family.
At the height of
his success, Quinn Sr. was the 12th richest man in the United Kingdom and the
richest in Ireland in 2008 with an estimated net worth of $6 billion. He
employed thousands, mostly in the previously job-starved cross-border area of
Fermanagh and Cavan.
But when he filed
for bankruptcy, the state-owned Irish Bank Resolution Corporation took the
properties into receivership as part of a $3 billion debt collection plan over
Quinn Sr. and his family.
In 2012, Irish
courts found Quinn Sr., his son, Sean Quinn Jr., and nephew, Peter Darragh
Quinn, in contempt for hiding millions in assets from the bank, including
Kyiv’s Ukraina shopping mall. All three were subsequently handed prison
sentences.
Yanez Puga and her
associates, were suspected of assisting certain Quinn family members to keep
Ukraina beyond the reach of state-owned Irish bank.
In August 2011,
Irish court documents show that Yanez Puga received a $500,000 “golden
parachute” payment from Sean Quinn Jr.
Members of the
Quinn family have told the Irish courts that Yanez Puga is no longer working in
their interests.
A crucial element
in disposing the Kyiv property was a chain of $45 million debt assignments over
Ukraina that originate at Demesne Investments in Northern Ireland where Sean
Quinn Sr. is a former director. In April 2011, Demesne transferred its rights
to Innishmore Consultancy, a Northern Ireland company run by Peter Quinn. Debt
rights were subsequently transferred to Lyndhurst Development Trading in
offshore British Virgin Islands.
Ukrainians
Serpokrylov, a lawyer, and Zaitsev, an economist, were found guilty for
“flagrantly and deliberately” defying a court ban on transferring any debts
surrounding the mall at Lyndhurst.
However, Kyiv
courts later recognized the transfer of the debt rights from Lyndhurst to
Ukrainian brokerage Elegant Invest via Zenit, another obscure local company,
despite Northern Irish court rulings.
Then, in April, a
Kyiv district court upheld a Belfast court’s ruling that declared the chain of
debt assignments worth $45 million over the shopping mall “null and void.”
And lawyers representing Irish Bank Resolution
Corporation on March 26th secured a six-month postponement on the enforcement
of the debt collection by Elegant Invest.
Levinzon, the mall’s current director, told the Kyiv
Post that some $5 million had been “illegally transferred” to Lyndhurst by the
mall’s former management in 2010-2012. The remaining $10 million was
transferred to Zenit and Elegant Invest.
He said “we believe” some of this money could have
ended up in the hands of Quinn family members.
Since April 2011, IBRC had been stalled by numerous
Ukrainian court battles to exercise its nearly 93 percent stakeholder rights to
assume control over the shopping center’s estimated $10 million rent roll.
Yanez Puga hasn’t responded to numerous Kyiv Post
inquiries. Since Levinzon took control of the mall in February, Yanez Puga’s
whereabouts are unknown. Leviznon said he doesn’t know how to contact her.
IBRC said many of the international assets are now
“distressed” and it only has full control of Ukraina shopping mall.
Kyiv Post
editor Mark Rachkevych can be reached at [email protected].
