A property dealer jailed for one of the UK’s biggest mortgage frauds a decade ago has been ordered to pay a further £92,500 – money which was recovered from a settlement over a donation to a private school.

In a short hearing today, His Honour Judge Baumgartner handed down his judgment at Southwark Crown Court where he ordered that Achilleas Kallakis pay £92,500 within 28 days. Failure to pay will mean Kallakis could face 12 months imprisonment.

At an earlier hearing the court heard that Kallakis made two donations in 2005, one of £75,000 and a second of £175,000 to Francis Holland School, an independent school attended by a family member. The school used the money to build a theatre with a plaque commemorating the benefactor.

Years later, following Kallakis' conviction and sentencing for fraud in 2013, the school removed the plaque and renamed the theatre. A confiscation order against Kallakis in the sum of £3.25 million was made in September 2014.

The school was sued for breach of contract in a bid to recover the donation and a settlement of £92,500 plus costs was reached between Kallakis’ son Michalis and the school.

Baumgartner found the £92,500 was the result of a ‘tainted gift’ and ‘forms part of the defendant’s recoverable amount’. He said Michalis – as the ‘interested party’ in proceedings - held his father’s ‘beneficial interest in the settlement amount’.

Kallakis and his co-conspirator Alexander Williams were convicted of conspiring to defraud banks of more than £750m in 2013. Kallakis was sentenced to seven years and five months imprisonment and six years of disqualification from acting as a company director.

He and Williams used forged or false documents to obtain loans to finance a property portfolio including homes in Mayfair and Knightsbridge and the headquarters of the Daily Telegraph in central London.

Director of the Serious Fraud Office Lisa Osofsky said: ‘Today’s ruling demonstrates our determination to go after fraudsters, no matter when they committed a crime or where they hide their assets. In the last two years alone, we have recovered 100% of the funds we have gone after – almost £140 million in proceeds of crime – including from cases a decade after prosecution like Kallakis.’

 

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