Anglo 'wrecked' country and 'bullied me', says Quinn

ANY LOSS to the Irish taxpayer as a result of the Quinn family moving valuable property assets beyond the reach of Anglo Irish bank is “Mickey Mouse” compared to the €5 billion loss to the taxpayer as a result of the bank’s “rape” of the Quinn group, Seán Quinn has told the High Court.

Mr Quinn said a very good business built up by him over decades was destroyed after he got involved with Anglo, which has “wrecked” Ireland, “bullied me out of office” and “made me a criminal in Irish society”.

Anglo “bankrupted me for €3 billion”, “tried to ruin me for ever”, had taken “our money, our company and our pride” and was acting as “judge, jury and executioner”.

“You guys are treating me as a criminal and want rid of me at all costs,” he told Paul Gallagher SC, for Anglo (now Irish Bank Resolution Corporation). “I should not be here.”

He was 65 years old, never in the High Court before and never involved in any litigation until he got involved with Anglo, he said. He had left school at 15, built up his company from one to about 7,000 employees and, as far as he was concerned, Anglo took it over illegally.

There were many heated and tetchy exchanges yesterday during the cross-examination of Mr Quinn in the continuing hearing of the bank’s application for orders for attachment and committal of the former billionaire, his son Seán and nephew Peter.

The three deny contempt of court orders of June and July 2011 restraining dissipation of assets in the Quinn international property group. They say steps to put assets beyond Anglo’s reach were taken before those orders were granted in proceedings where the bank, owed €2.8 billion by Quinn companies, claims the family was trying to put foreign properties with a value of up to €500 million beyond its reach.

Among the contempt claims against Mr Quinn is that he was involved in assignment of about $130 million (€99 million) worth of loans to a Belize entity for nominal consideration on or after July 20th, 2011, and back-dating those loans to April 2011.

It is also alleged he was involved in an alleged fraudulent assignment on or after July 6th, 2011, of a €45.2 million debt to a Northern Ireland company, Innishmore, controlled by Peter Darragh Quinn, with a view to taking control of a Ukrainian property asset worth about $78 million.

When Mr Gallagher asked yesterday how Mr Quinn could say he never heard of Northern Ireland company Demesne when he was a director of it, Mr Quinn said there were about 100 Quinn companies in 14 countries and he would not know the names “of 5 per cent of them”.

The companies were run professionally by his staff and others and audited annually.

Mr Quinn said his children and in-laws had responsibility for administration of companies in the international property group both before and after Anglo took over Quinn companies in April 2011 and he left it to them. He told them in April 2011 to challenge everything so as to put assets beyond Anglo’s reach but had not acted in contempt of the court orders, he said.

While he was greatly concerned, when signing documents in April 2011, that steps being taken by the family could cause damage to their assets, he felt he had no option. He was “a wealth creator, not a wealth destroyer”, but the destruction Anglo had created over the last few years was “far greater than anything we have caused”.

When asking him in April 2011 to sign documents as part of a plan to move assets beyond Anglo’s reach, his nephew Peter had said the family might get something but there were “no assurances”. Any possibility of getting anything was “better than dealing with Anglo”. Mr Gallagher said the bank did not accept Mr Quinn’s claim he had no involvement after April 2011 in putting assets beyond Anglo’s reach, including the assignment of Stg£100 million loans for a consideration of about €2,900.

Mr Quinn replied he was not a liar.

After repeated tetchy exchanges about what Mr Quinn knew about steps to transfer properties beyond the bank’s reach, Ms Justice Elizabeth Dunne told Mr Quinn cross-examination would proceed more smoothly if he directly answered counsel’s questions.