draining development.pdf - Khazar University

The Kleptocrat’s Portfolio Decisions 433However, in July 2007, Alamieyeseigha put an end to delays in theNigerian criminal proceedings. He pleaded guilty to six charges of makingfalse declarations of assets and caused two of his offshore companiesto plead guilty to 23 charges of money laundering. He was sentenced totwo years in prison for each personal charge, to run concurrently. A confiscationorder was made over some (but, for technical reasons, not all)of his domestic and international assets, which was enforced domesticallyand could have been enforced overseas. However, by that stage, itappeared that the assets would be recovered more quickly using theexisting civil proceedings rather than starting a new process by seekingto enforce the Nigerian confiscation order through a request to theUnited Kingdom for mutual legal assistance.Nigeria reapplied for summary judgment in the civil proceedings inrelation to those assets deriving from the criminal conduct that had beenadmitted by Alamieyeseigha and his companies, arguing that the guiltypleas meant that Alamieyeseigha’s defense had no reasonable prospect ofsuccess in relation to those assets. That application succeeded in December2007. The court agreed that the guilty pleas destroyed the alreadyweak defense and that Alamieyeseigha had been given the opportunityto “confront his accusers,” but had, instead, accepted the charges madeagainst him.The civil proceedings continued in relation to the remaining assets.Nigeria made applications for orders requiring Alamieyeseigha to discloseinformation and documents. He failed to do so. In February 2008,Nigeria obtained an order requiring Alamieyeseigha to comply with theorders, with the sanction that his defense would be struck out and judgmentgranted to Nigeria if he failed to do so. The required informationand documents were not provided, and, on July 2, 2008, Nigeria obtainedjudgment over the remaining assets in Cyprus, Denmark, and London.Foreign proceedingsThe English judgment over the Cypriot and Danish bank accounts wasenforced under European Community legislation for the mutual recognitionand enforcement of civil judgments.The Cape Town penthouse was secured by a freezing injunctionobtained by the South African authorities in support of requests formutual legal assistance in criminal matters from Nigeria and the United