Latest news with #Taktouk
Daily Mail
01-05-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
Tycoon who paid for divorce with £2.5m fraud after wife dumped him for Cesc Fabregas faces fresh court fight to keep his cash
A disgraced tycoon who paid for his divorce with a massive £2.5 million property fraud after his wife left him for Cesc Fabregas will face a fresh court fight to keep his cash this November. Elie Taktouk, 50, married Lebanese model Daniella Semaan, 49, in 1998 before she left him for the current Spanish football manager - who was previously an Arsenal and Chelsea star. Taktouk had lost his former family home in Belgravia to Ms Semaan and Fabregas after failing to block the £5.5 million sale of the flat to the footballer at the Court of Appeal. The Grade-II listed property, just down the road from Buckingham Palace, had been put up for sale in 2013 so Taktouk could provide cash in the divorce settlement with his former wife. The Taktouk family boasts a range of business interests in Nigeria and Lebanon in transport, flour mills, insurance, and property. Taktouk was convicted of 11 charges of fraud by a jury and jailed for seven years in 2021, after funnelling cash given to him to renovate a multi-million pound property to fund his extravagant lifestyle. Of an almost £2.5 million total investment, he spent £200,000 on divorce fees for proceedings concerning Ms Semaan, as well as tens of thousands on trips to Harrods, a £28,000 Porsche and renting a £21,000-per-month Kensington apartment. Judge Alexander Milne KC made a confiscation ruling in the sum of £4.5m at Southwark Crown Court in November 2023. He had ordered Taktouk should serve eight years in jail consecutive to the seven-year term for fraud if the money was not paid in default. But Taktouk successfully appealed against the order at the Court of Appeal in February. Taktouk has since been released from prison and appeared at Southwark Crown Court via video-link today. He will face a fresh hearing under the Proceeds of Crime Act on November 5 but was told he must give 14 days notice if intends to travel abroad in the meantime. Timothy Moloney, for Taktouk, said: 'Essentially 14 days notice of departure and return before travelling outside the jurisdiction.' 'He has made no attempt to leave the jurisdiction since the time he has been at liberty since his release. 'He has served his seven-year sentence of imprisonment. There is no incentive for him to abscond at this point.' During the first confiscation hearing Taktouk accepted his father was a wealthy man, but said: 'Any detail I knew about his wealth was based on what I understood, what I saw, what I assumed.' Youssef Taktouk was one of the richest men in Ibadan, Nigeria, where he lived for much of his life. Semaan gives her husband Fabregas a kiss on the lips during a family holiday in Switzerland in December 2019 Elie and his brother Dr Wassim Taktouk were shareholders in his father's company Wasseli, the court heard. He had told the hearing his father was worth £187m. Elie, a director of JMT Property Ltd, was convicted by a jury of eleven charges of fraud after property developer Adrian Noël and his father Frank launched a private prosecution against him. The charges related to the renovation of a £7m Grade-II listed apartment in Ennismore Gardens, Knightsbridge. The Noëls made an initial investment which helped to buy the property - and then made ten additional investments at Elie's request for works to be done while he was project manager. Instead of using their investments to help pay for a jacuzzi and other renovations Taktouk used the cash to fund his extravagant lifestyle. He failed to keep up with payments due to the National Bank of Abu Dhabi, and the Noëls lost just under £2.5m after their property was seized. Taktouk also faked invoices for a building firm for work that was never done, and tried to shift the blame for the fake invoices onto company boss Joseph Farah. Case papers revealed the Noëls lost the whole of their investment which totalled £2,490,546.69. Court documents showed Elie used more than £200,000 of the funds to pay legal fees from his divorce from Ms Semaan. He also spent more than £20,000 of expensive private school fees for his children; a £28,000 Porsche; a £21,000 a month property in Kensington; Georgio Armani clothes; shopping sprees in Harrods and splurging out on high-value furniture. Lord Justice Edis, sitting with two other judges, had granted Taktouk's grounds for appealing the original confiscation order saying the court 'should receive fresh evidence from the appellant's brother, Dr Wassim Taktouk, who is the executor of the estate of their late father.' Lord Justice Edis said: 'This is said to show that the judge's finding that the appellant had an interest in family-owned assets which he had not been truthful about was wrong.' He said Judge Milne had 'conducted these proceedings with great skill and fairness and delivered, as we have said, an exemplary ruling.
The Independent
05-02-2025
- The Independent
Cesc Fabregas's love rival wins court fight against huge £4.5m court bill
An "inadequate" businessman who descended into a life of crime after his wife dumped him for Premier League legend Cesc Fabregas has won a fight against a £4.5million court bill. Elie Taktouk, 49, underwent a traumatic and high-profile divorce after his wife, Lebanese model Daniella Semaan, left him for then Barcelona midfielder Fabregas in 2011. Following the divorce, Taktouk embarked on a campaign of fraud, conning property investors out of their cash, which he spent on his lawyers' bills, rent, his kids' school fees, and to buy a Porsche. He claimed he did nothing wrong, but was convicted in 2021 of nine counts of fraud and two of using a false instrument at Southwark Crown Court and jailed for seven years. He was then hauled before the courts again and in November 2023 was handed a £4.5million confiscation order, stripping him of the proceeds of his crime. But he appealed and has now had the order overturned after senior judges heard he might not be quite the multi-millionaire the confiscation judge thought he was. Fresh evidence from his brother Dr Wassim Taktouk suggested that far from having an interest in significant family wealth, Taktouk had in fact been cut out of his father's will and no right to any family money. Sitting at the Court of Appeal, Lord Justice Edis, Mr Justice Saini and Judge Anthony Leonard KC have now quashed the confiscation order and sent it back to be reconsidered in light of the fresh evidence. Elie Taktouk married Miss Semaan, now 49, in Lebanon in 1998, but they split 13 years later when she left him for Spanish ex-Arsenal and Chelsea star Fabregas, 37. In his divorce he was ordered to pay her £1.4m and also lost the £5.5m family home in Belgravia to his ex and Fabregas after failing to block its sale to the footballer at the Court of Appeal. Taktouk's crimes were connected to the purchase and planned redevelopment of a £7.5m apartment in Ennismore Gardens, Knightsbridge, between 2015 and 2017. The flat was bought using bridging finance, with half of the required cash portion stumped up by investors who had been introduced to Taktouk by an intermediary. However, the project was a failure after problems with the freeholder, with the apartment eventually being sold for only £5.5m at auction and the investors losing £2.5m. During a previous Appeal Court hearing, Lord Justice Stuart-Smith said that, during the project, Taktouk had repeatedly diverted investors' money to his own accounts, which he used to spend on rent, school fees, a car and his lawyers' bills. He used forged documents and faked invoices, and misled them about the health of the project, telling them a standard mortgage had been obtained, rather than bridging finance which ran up £61,000-a-month in interest. After becoming suspicious, the investors paid for an investigation into Taktouk's dealings, resulting in a private prosecution being brought and him being jailed. The crown court heard medical evidence which suggested that Taktouk is "inadequate and submissive in aspects of his character," with the sentencing judge agreeing. At Southwark Crown Court in November 2023, a confiscation order in the sum of about £4.5m was made after a judge concluded that was the benefit of his crimes and that he had not proved he had access to less. The judge found that Taktouk had an interest in family-owned assets which he had not been truthful about during the confiscation proceedings. But the case went on to the Court of Appeal last month after his brother came forward with new evidence, casting doubt on Taktouk's access to family wealth. Dr Wassim Taktouk told the court that his businessman father had died in 2022 and that his final will in 2016 left nothing to his brother Elie. He said that, until his father's death, he knew nothing about family assets, but that since then he had discovered they are relatively worthless and amount to far less than the confiscation order sum. He had been estranged from his brother, partly because he blamed him for leaving their father in financial difficulties in his later years, and took little interest in the criminal proceedings. He told the court his brother had "no legal interest" in any of his father's estate or in any other family assets of which he was aware. Giving judgment, Lord Justice Edis said Dr Taktouk's evidence was "capable of belief" and that he had shown himself an "honest witness," who had himself been particularly damning of his brother's conduct. "If anything, Dr Taktouk in his witness statement is even more damning about his brother's credibility than was the judge and it is therefore common ground before us that the appellant is not to be believed about anything relevant to this case," he said. Continuing, he said: "It is undoubtedly capable of belief that [Dr Taktouk] has acquired knowledge of his father's true wealth since he became his executor in December 2022. "This is a process which began then, and has continued since the conclusion of the confiscation proceedings." That meant there is "plausible evidence" which might show that the amount of money Taktouk has access to is "significantly less" than the £4.5m he was said to have benefited from in relation to his crimes. He quashed the confiscation order and sent the case back to Southwark Crown Court to be considered in light of the fresh evidence from Taktouk's brother.
