Patrick Kelly

[Admin]

Published: Sunday, March 21, 2004

In four decades developing more than $1 billion worth of property in Ireland, Kelly has relied on an affable nature to win deals and make money. It's a strategy that's worked: His Redquartz Development Ltd. has become one of Ireland's largest and most prominent developers. He has amassed a fortune he estimates at between $150 million and $200 million.

"He's one of a dozen key players in this town," said Dublin City Manager John Fitzgerald, who's worked as the top administrator in Ireland's capital since 1996. "People here think he has a good record. They trust him."

Kelly is now among the key players in Sarasota, too, the result of his $60 million acquisition of the Sarasota Quay in late January. Tentative plans call for $1 billion worth of development on the waterfront property between the Ritz-Carlton Hotel and the Hyatt Sarasota.

"He's a pusher this one," laughs Kelly friend John Walsh, a retired banker. "He may have a smile on his face but he's a pusher underneath."

"He's one of the best there is at researching and then creating a vision for a piece of property," said John McCabe, a Kelly partner, Quay investor and former carpenter who owns and runs a 150-employee construction firm, McCabe Builders.

For the first time, Kelly's now trying to make something happen in America.

If Kelly's $1 billion vision is realized, it will mean thousands of hotel rooms, condominiums, offices and stores, along with a spa and conference center, in a massive project that could fundamentally change the city of Sarasota.

"He's not a greedy person," said John Lydon, an Irish developer and Kelly partner in a $625 million redevelopment of a historic Dublin market known as Smithfield. "He makes sure that everyone on his team is happy."

"Everyone has enemies, but I've never heard a bad word about him," David Drumm, head of Anglo-Irish Bank plc's banking operations in Dublin and the United States, said of Kelly early last month.

The Sarasota Quay will be another example of Kelly's willingness to share. When it's completed, Kelly expects to own just 20 percent. The rest of the project will be in the hands of various partners.

It's a formula that not only brings Kelly outside expertise but often insulates him from risk, an important factor for a developer whose career has pushed through numerous financial setbacks and even bankruptcy.

He, his wife, Maureen (Donohoe), and their family spent years getting by as the construction business sputtered in a stagnant Irish economy.

But the couple's life together began under spartan conditions. Their first home was a 10-by-20-foot trailer that Kelly parked on a 60-acre tract he planned to build on.

That same year (1969), with a lethargic economy showing few signs of awakening, Kelly and his brothers sought the Irish equivalent of Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection to restructure crushing debts.

"It took about 18 months, but ultimately, we cleared everything up," Kelly said during a daylong interview late last month. "We had the right answers; we just weren't liquid enough to implement them."

Before the restructuring was complete, the first of the Kellys' four children was born.

Today, the eldest, Emma, runs a public relations firm in Dublin, while sons Simon and Chris are directors and partners in Redquartz, a holding company operated by just a dozen employees. The youngest child, John, is preparing to go to college.

After the restructuring, the Kellys were hit again. An ephemeral homebuilding boom fizzled, prompting Paddy to chuck a blue Rolls Royce he had acquired to celebrate his success.

The climb back this time was slow, and the family moved many times to wherever Kelly was building homes.

A turning point came when he began developing condominiums and factories in England. Eventually, business was good enough for the couple to settle into a $450,000 house on Dublin's tony Shrewsbury Road.

Whether stung by the bankruptcy or simply because of his nature, Kelly began working with partners in earnest. For a percentage of end profits, Kelly lessened his risk and avoided tying up huge amounts of his own money in any one deal.

He also made partners of key employees, which provided incentive, ensured loyalty and enabled him to attract talent.

Bringing in partners also allowed Kelly to work on several deals at once. For the most part, the investors were friends.

"I've never succeeded in anything where I wasn't friends with someone," Kelly said.

Before long, Kelly became business partners with Anglo-Irish Bank plc, Ireland's third-largest bank and the lender that has financed most of his projects, including the Quay purchase.

In most cases, Kelly invests 25 percent to 35 percent of the capital required, and Anglo-Irish and partners make up the balance.

But while Kelly's business in England took off throughout the late 1970s and 1980s, the Irish economy lagged.

Just as importantly, he developed the skills necessary to leverage government incentives.

Kelly also learned the fine art of marketing, an emphasis that continues today.

At Smithfield Market, where Kelly and partners are developing condominiums, hotel rooms, stores, offices, a theater and parking in a historic but dilapidated section of Dublin's west end, Redquartz spent $600,000 to construct a high-tech sales center equip- ped with computer-generated images.

Buoyed by good deals and fortunes in the late 1970s, Kelly, his wife, and several friends became Lloyd's Names, shareholders in the Lloyd's of London insurance conglomerate.

In exchange for investing $500,000 in Lloyd's, Kelly expected to receive periodic dividend checks. The designation also brought a prestige that the Kelly family had never known.

But in 1990, Lloyd's was forced to pay a string of massive claims on asbestos policies, for natural disasters and an oil spill. The company turned to its shareholders for more than $12 billion.

Lloyd's wanted $4 million from Kelly. The insurer went to his friends for $30 million. To cover the bill, Kelly and Maureen were forced to sell their home for about $1.4 million.

Despite the blow, Kelly's portfolio grew along with the surging Irish economy.

In 1989, he and McCabe had built 500,000 square feet of retail space southwest of Dublin, sealing their first deal together over a cup of coffee.

Kelly followed the retail project in Tallaght, whose name is derived from the Irish word for "grave," by developing a collection of "serviced apartments," similar to extended-stay hotel rooms.

Through the Prem Group, a company he formed, he turned old Georgian houses into office blocks.

Kelly also ventured outside Dublin to complete office developments.

In Clonskeagh, a Dublin suburb, Kelly's team built a 10-building complex that would be the European headquarters for Compaq Computers. Completed in 1998, the 360,000-square-foot, red-brick offices were taken over by Hewlett-Packard Co. after the computer giants merged.

In 1996, Kelly went into the hotel business, striking a deal with Maryland-based Choice Hotels International to build the Clarion and other Choice brands.

Along the way, he also bought a sliver of Bewley's, a famous Irish coffee house chain, and a stake in Mango, a Spanish fashion line making a splash in trendy Irish clothing stores. Kelly became involved in Mango through friend and partner Hugh McGivern, another Quay investor.

At the former dock lands, because of incentives offered by a government-created redevelopment authority, gleaming financial services-oriented office buildings replaced sooty industrial buildings.

"This used to be bandit land," Grainne Hollywood, director of property at the Dublin Docklands Development Authority, said during an interview at Kelly's Clarion Hotel Dublin on Docklands property. "You just didn't come here."

Today, more than 13,000 people come to the Docklands to work.

Students occupy the former docks, too. Eighteen months ago, Kelly completed a $100 million, single-building campus for the National College of Ireland on donated city land. Developed with $54 million in government tax incentives, the campus also contains 278 student apartments and parking.

Kelly received tax credits for the student housing, too. Under an agreement with the college, Kelly's team will own the apartments for a decade and reap tax credits. In 2012, the college will buy the dorms back for $26 million.

"They knew they were building a college, not just a building," said O'Connor, the president of the National College of Ireland. "They had that mindset."

Adjacent to the college, Kelly developed a four-star, 162-room Clarion Hotel and 200 upscale condominiums that sold for an average of $350,000 each.

The condos were among the first in Ireland to be completed after the government mandated that 20 percent of all new units be set aside as affordable housing.

South of the River Liffey, a blue ribbon that splits Dublin, Kelly won an international competition to build condos at the Docklands' Grand Canal Dock.

Some of the land, toxic from years of industrial pollution and neglect, is being scraped up and shipped to Germany and Holland for decontamination. It will be reused in asphalt roads.

Despite prices in the hundreds of thousands of dollars per unit, the 278 waterfront Gallery Quay condos sold out in three days. In all, the eight-story building generated sales of roughly $100 million.

Away from the docks, Kelly revamped an old children's hospital into offices for one of Dublin's top legal firms, bought the hip Morrison hotel where suites rent for as much as $1,600 a night and added to his portfolio of office buildings.

Today he is one of the largest hoteliers in Ireland, owning or managing 29 properties, including the Steamboat Quay Clarion in Limerick, the nation's third-tallest building.

"He's exceeded our wildest expectations in just a couple of years," said Haase, the senior vice president of Choice Hotels' international development division.

"It happened quickly because of his ability to put together effective deals," Haase said. "We weren't on the map in Europe until Paddy set up Choice Hotels Ireland."

Kelly's Prem Group has expanded as well. It now controls more than a dozen office buildings and 200 so-called "serviced," or extended-stay, condominiums.

Although he and Maureen had to give up the Shrewsbury Road house, they built another on land they retained after the sale. Today, the mansion is worth about $13 million.

Kelly has replaced the Rolls with a 745 li BMW, a $67,000 car with a leather and wood-trimmed interior and Norah Jones in the CD player.

He's a member of the exclusive Powerscourt Golf Club, and often skis on some of the best powder in the world. In January, the Kelly family vacationed in the French Alps.

Kelly's partners also have fared well. After losing millions in a down English housing market in the late 1980s, McCabe bounced back. He now lives on a gated country estate that the former carpenter built himself. Finished with rich woods and a tastefully decorated interior, it has an indoor swimming pool, a fitness center, a tennis court and gardens.

Walsh buys sailboats the way some people acquire collectibles. He and his wife travel constantly, the reward for years of hard work and patient investing.

For his part, Kelly now seems most intent on providing a platform for the future of Redquartz, a business to be inherited by sons Simon and Chris.

The Quay, the most ambitious project of Kelly's life, could prove a keystone to ensuring that future and to providing a foundation for Redquartz's next generation.

[Admin]

Posted: November 18, 2004

Patrick "Paddy" Kelly. The owner of Redquartz Development, with four decades of property deals under his belt. His personal fortune is estimated at $150-200 million (3.7-4.9 billion Kc).

Prague footprint: Markland Group, his joint project with Ballymore's Sean Mulryan, bought two office buildings at Revolucni 1 and 3 (15.7 million euros, 13,200 square meters) this year. Likely to get stung by the dubious purchase of the Kotva shopping center (54 million euros, 12,000 square meters). "According to the true owners ... the property was effectively stolen goods. Because of that, the transaction should be null and void," says CBRE's Colin Waddell.

Sean Mulryan. Since 1982, the founder and Chairman of Ballymore Properties. Currently, he claims 7.7 billion euros (245 billion Kc) worth of projects in the pipeline. In Bratislava, Ballymore is developing Eurovea, a 200,000-square meter retail, office and housing complex.

Prague footprint: Ballymore bought five-building and 60,000-square meter block at Wenceslas Square 13 and 15, Panska 8 and 10, Jindrisska 7 for 801.5 million Kc (2004) with plans to invest "several billion" crowns in the site. Owns 12 Hybernska Street, the location of Ballymore's Prague office. In spring 2005, will begin construction of Statenicky mlyn, a 20 million euro project of 32 villas and 85 apartments. Involved in Markland Group with Paddy Kelly.

[Admin]

Published: Thursday, November 16, 2006

SARASOTA -- Sonia Hamouda stood on principle last year when the Dublin-based redevelopers of the Sarasota Quay wanted to buy her tiny El Vernona apartment for its $1 billion project.

She didn't want to leave her quaint, 782-square-foot residence -- even for $1 million, and even though dozens of her neighbors had taken developer Irish American Management Services Ltd.'s smaller offers for their aging units.

She resolved to stay put in her 44-year-old condo, even if it meant enduring years of dust and noise and disruption while a complex of condos, hotel rooms, shops and parking spaces was constructed.

Earlier this week, though, Hamouda's resolve seemed to melt away, for $1.5 million.

For Irish American, a Patrick Kelly-led investment group, Monday's $1,918-per-square-foot purchase of Hamouda's two-bedroom, one-bath unit marks an end to an 18-month saga to purchase 48 condos adjacent to the nine-story Quay.

But it also marks a potential beginning of a connection between the planned Sarasota Bayside development -- slated to contain stores like Ralph Lauren and Gucci -- and the city's fledgling cultural district, now occupied by the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall and other attractions.

"This means we can more easily line up with the cultural district," said Brett Hutchens, president and chief executive of Casto Lifestyle Properties, Irish American's partner in the Bayside plan.

"It takes the conversations we've had with the city about connection out of the realm of a maybe and into the realm of reality," he added.

During those conversations, held earlier this year, Casto and Irish American proposed building a road -- New High Street -- through the Quay property and the cultural district, from Fruitville Road to 10th Street.

The new roadway would not only connect Bayside and the cultural district tract, it also would remove some traffic from clogged U.S. 41.

Another part of the Casto plan would finance cultural district infrastructure, such as roads, sewers and lighting, which could cost as much as $40 million.

Hamouda's condo, which cost her less than $75,000 in May 1998, blocked any such plans, though. It stood almost directly in the path of New High Street.

Even if the cultural district link never occurs, the Hamouda purchase gives Irish American clear title to an entire tract bounded by U.S. 41, Fruitville Road and Boulevard of the Arts.

With 15 acres rather than the Quay's original 10 acres, Irish American will be able to increase condo density and add stores and offices and hotel rooms.

"We're happy with the outcome in that now we can move forward with our master planning without anything in the way," said Jeffrey Gareau, a local Irish American representative.

"It would have been difficult to design a mixed-use project with a holdout in the way," he added. "So we're happy that we came to a fair resolution."

Hamouda's feelings remain a mystery. She declined to comment, through the president of her father's Punta Gorda aircraft parts company.

She is now living in the One Hundred Central condo building downtown, a new 11-story tower adjacent to the Whole Foods Market Centre.

The purchase of Hamouda's 514 El Vernona Ave. condo cost Irish American more than twice the amount of the next-highest unit, which sold for $667,000, according to Sarasota County property records.

On average, the El Vernona condos sold for $313,470. Before the Hamouda sale, Irish American had spent just less than $15 million for the other 47 units there.

The Hamouda-Irish American saga began in early 2005, when the developer began snapping up El Vernona units. As they did with most of the condos, Irish American offered the Hamoudas about $250,000, a figure the family rejected out of hand.

They countered the unit held the key to the entire Quay redevelopment, and as such, they wanted $3.5 million.

"We didn't ask Patrick Kelly to come into our lives," Hamouda's father, Louis, said in September 2005.

Months elapsed and the negotiations dragged. At some point, Irish American proposed a $1 million purchase, but only if a third went to charity. The Hamoudas balked.

In turn, Kelly directed his London-based architects to design the project around Hamouda's unit, in much the same way some buildings are constructed in New York, Hong Kong and Europe.

Last spring, Kelly traveled to Punta Gorda to meet with Louis Hamouda personally. Though the impasse remained, the session apparently broke the proverbial ice.

Before long, the two sides resumed discussions that led to Monday's $1.5 million deal.

But Irish American doesn't plan on keeping Hamouda's place around long for posterity's sake.

Bruce Franklin, president of the ADP Group Inc. and an Irish American consultant, said the developer will seek city permission to raze the last remaining El Vernona condo building in the next few days.

If that occurs, the demolition could dovetail with a city Planning Board hearing on Bayside on Nov. 29. If that panel approves the project, Bayside will be voted on by the City Commission -- the final required approval before construction could begin -- in early January.

The Quay building itself it slated to come down sometime in the first quarter of 2007.

"This was the last piece, and it'll help us work with the city to achieve the cultural district goals," Franklin said of the Hamouda purchase.

[Admin]

Published: Thursday, April 10, 2008

There have been $1 billion worth of plans drawn and redrawn, players in and players out, a spectacular collapse of the area's condominium market, an attempt by a single condo owner to block the entire project, and truckloads of scrap from a noisy metal-on-concrete demolition.

But few of the twists have matched the complexity -- or caused the bewilderment -- of the case involving Bussoleno Ltd.

On its surface, the Virgin Islands company's lawsuit against Quay owner Irish American Management Services Ltd., Kelly and partners reads like any of the hundreds of foreclosure suits snaking their way through Sarasota circuit court.

Behind the court records, though, is a tale of a three-decade-old friendship now fractured, and the peculiar relationship of a father claiming millions of dollars, his son and the offspring's employer, who happens to be the Quay's Irish owner.

While it is too early to tell what impact Bussoleno's claim that Irish American is delinquent on $7.7 million in loans will have on plans to build on one of Florida's premier development sites, it is clear that the litigation has left Kelly shaken.

"We couldn't believe it when it came up," Kelly said in a recent phone interview. "We were very disappointed and surprised. I was very upset."

The primary object of Kelly's disappointment is Rene Gareau, a friend of 30 years with whom the Dublin developer had vacationed in exotic locales like the Italian island of Sardinia.

Depending on the source, Gareau is either Bussoleno's agent and creator or an uninvolved third party.

Kelly said Gareau created Bussoleno years ago, as a trust for his children. Gareau's son Jeffrey is an Irish American Management Services executive vice president.

Jeffrey Gareau declined to comment on the dispute.

"It's Rene's company, he set it up," said Kelly, who along with Irish American partners John McCabe and John Walsh guaranteed the loans from Bussoleno. "It's a trust for his kids. That's my understanding."

Rene Gareau, however, maintains he has no involvement in Bussoleno.

"I am not a registered agent for Bussoleno," he said. "That is totally, totally incorrect. If they said that, that is incorrect."

Gareau said Kelly -- "Paddy" to those who know him well -- has a habit of getting things wrong.

"Paddy is a very confusing individual," Gareau said. "He makes a lot of comments that are totally incorrect."

Adding to the confusion, Kelly and partners contend in a countersuit that Gareau, too, signed on and provided an "unconditional guaranty" of the outstanding promissory notes owed to Bussoleno.

What neither party disputes is that beginning in August 2003, Irish American and its members borrowed millions of dollars from Bussoleno.

Last December, Bussoleno "accelerated" payment of $5.43 million that remained outstanding on the notes after Bussoleno claimed Irish American missed required payments, according to the court filing.

Much of the rest of the case, though, remains murky, including why Irish American borrowed from Bussoleno to begin with.

The lawsuit states the loans were accelerated because Irish American failed "to prevent waste, impairment or deterioration of the mortgaged property," the Quay. Irish American has spent an estimated $100 million to acquire the former Quay and surrounding properties and raze the derelict buildings there.

Payment on another promissory note was sped up because Irish American had taken out another loan on the property from Anglo Irish Bank of Dublin, one of Kelly's primary lenders.

"The court record will show he is delinquent," Gareau said of Kelly.

"There is no question about it. He was delinquent on Dec. 1 and delinquent on March 1," added Gareau, while declining to specify how he is aware of the delinquency since he says he is not part of Bussoleno.

Kelly maintains that payments on the notes are current, though payments were made to Gareau directly, not Bussoleno. Any "technical defaults" were the result of "bona fide errors," Kelly's court response states.

As to the Anglo Irish loan, Kelly and his partners said Bussoleno was aware of the mortgage, but "never previously asserted that such a mortgage created a default."

They maintain it is Gareau who is now acting in bad faith, and that foreclosure is not possible because Bussoleno failed to officially record the mortgage with Sarasota County.

The Bussoleno lawsuit marks the second time litigation has threatened to hold up Irish American's plans. In 2005, when Kelly and partners were buying up four dozen small condos adjacent to the Quay, a lone holdout threatening to block Bayside development demanded millions of dollars in exchange for her deed.

In November 2006, holdout Sonia Hamouda sold her aging, 782-square-foot unit -- purchased in May 1998 for $74,900 -- to Irish American for $1.5 million, property records show.

Meanwhile, Kelly and Irish American are moving forward with their plans for a revamped quay, which will be known as Sarasota Bayside.

Though plans originally called for a trio of 18-story residential towers on the 15-acre property, together with a mix of upscale hotel rooms, shops and restaurants, office space and parking, Kelly's architects have reworked Bayside's designs.

Originally designed to contain 700 condominiums, Bayside will likely contain a few hundred less. In their place, the number of hotel rooms and office space will be increased, Kelly said.

At the same time, an expensive underground parking level is being eliminated, and Kelly has brought on a trio of former WCI Communities Inc. executives to develop Bayside's residential space.

Redquartz USA, led by former WCI executive Christopher Hanlan, is a partnership between Kelly and the trio. It joins Casto Lifestyle Properties, a Sarasota company that is Bayside's retail development partner. Redquartz also is the name of the Kelly family's holding company based in Dublin, Ireland.

"We have a strong local team now," Kelly said. "If interest rates continue to stay down and other factors go in our favor, we could begin marketing blocks just after Christmas 2008."

As to Bussoleno and Gareau, whom Kelly bailed out of a public relations nightmare in 2003 with a $1.3 million check to shutter the notorious In Extremis nightclub that had become a nuisance to neighbors, the Irish developer is cool.

"We're dumbfounded this has happened," he said of the Bussoleno lawsuit. "This wouldn't have happened in Ireland."

Gareau, meanwhile, said his relationship with Kelly remains intact. He claims that regardless of the outcome of the lawsuit, he is "probably not interested" in becoming a part owner of the Bayside project.

"We are not fighting or anything. We just all have our liabilities and we are going to have to live up to them," he said. "Personally, we are not fighting."

[Admin]

Published: Monday, June 11, 2012

SARASOTA - What was known -- and what wasn't -- by bankers and developers involved in the former Sarasota Bayside project seven years ago is the overriding theme of hundreds of pages of court records filed in a foreclosure lawsuit on the 15-acre, waterfront property.

The deposition of Patrick Kelly, the Dublin developer who led the proposed $1 billion Irish American Management Services Ltd. project, provides particular insights into the unwinding of a 25-year-long friendship with Rene Gareau, who was among those who sold the former Quay to Irish American.

Kelly maintains the rift with Gareau represents the heart of a simmering local court dispute over the foreclosure.

Kelly equates Gareau with Bussoleno Ltd., a U.S. Virgin Islands company that is opposing Irish American lender Anglo Irish Bank's foreclosure on the Quay property.

Bussoleno maintains it is owed nearly $6 million on mortgages from 2005 and earlier that were never recorded. In an affidavit filed last year, Gareau described himself as the "Trustee/Protector" of Bussoleno, despite previously denying having any official role with the company.

Bussoleno contends that the unrecorded mortgages to Kelly and Irish American were in place before loans worth tens of millions of dollars in Anglo Irish were cut, which could make its claim to the remaining value of the land superior to the bank's.

In deposition after deposition of bank officials and Irish American, Bussoleno attorney Steven Hutton establishes that bank officials knew -- probably as early as 2004 -- that the unrecorded mortgages existed. In his affidavit, Gareau claims the bank's maneuvers are aimed at getting "Bussoleno to discount or abandon what it is owed."

But Kelly's deposition puts a different face on the documents.

Under questioning by Hutton, Kelly maintains that the reason the mortgages were not recorded is that they were a favor between friends -- that is, him and Gareau.

That friendship could be seen after Irish American acquired the Quay in early 2004 for roughly $60 million. Then, Kelly hired Gareau's son, Jeff, to head the group's local operations -- even though the younger Gareau had little development experience.

While his deposition is disjointed at points, Kelly's regret and anger over what happened comes through clearly.

"The second mortgage with Gareau, we never as such treated it as a second mortgage," he said, when asked about a particular $2.25 million unrecorded mortgage.

"With hindsight, I would say Rene had his own plan and it was a second line just in case; he had come on board, as far as I was concerned, all along as a partner, a corporate partner. And that only changed much later and it didn't change at this point ...

"So what we had was a full deal in principal" with the partners and drivers of the Sarasota Bayside project being him, Gareau and two others, Kelly said.

"That only changed and Rene produced documents, in a trust relationship that we didn't get a lot of advice on, independent advice, and this was in our minds as time went on, with benefit of hindsight, we felt that the wool was pulled over our eyes, to put it mildly.

"I remember finally in Dublin, when it was explained to us by Rene that while he owed us a lot of money, he was essentially bankrupt, but we owed independently monies to his company, whatever it is called, what's it called again?"

Hutton answered: "Bussoleno?"

And Kelly continued, "Bussoleno. So we knew we had been had, put simply."

The Dublin developer went on to claim that the unrecorded mortgages were put together because Gareau wanted to separate himself from the Canadian investors he had owned the Quay with, and that Gareau would owe to Irish American, while Kelly would pay Gareau the same amount.

"As far as we were concerned, we were funding him on the other side, so he had the mortgage, but I don't know what date we had essentially redeemed that mortgage, it was paid off by us funding him. But of course we realized he separated himself from Bussoleno and we ended up with him owing us the money and we owing Bussoleno the money. ... So that's where we hit big problems with him.

"What I am trying to say is that I know that that mortgage was there for Rene's benefit, not for ours, and we had advanced money against that. Rene obviously had it in his mind that he could use that against us in the future, which he did, but we were naive in our -- I suppose we were in a trusting relationship, as we would normally have with people we do business with, but in this case -- and that was my fault."

[Admin]

Published: Tuesday, May 21, 2013

SARASOTA - The Irish bank that lent roughly $100 million for the development at the former Sarasota Quay property squared off in court Monday against former owners to decide who is entitled to eventual sales proceeds.

Though thousands of foreclosure lawsuits have slogged through local courts in recent years, few have carried the impact of the 15-acre Quay land, which is considered among the most valuable urban tracts statewide.

Lender Anglo-Irish Bank, which is now controlled by the Irish government, filed to foreclose on the property two years ago, after a Dublin developer's proposed $1 billion project stalled. Developer Irish American Management Services Ltd. defaulted on its loans in 2008.

But a group led by two Canadians -- Rene Gareau and Shelly Fenton -- that owned the Quay and sold the land to Irish American in 2004 now claim to have unrecorded mortgages and liens on the property valued at nearly $10 million.

The debt and liens have hampered Anglo-Irish's ability to take possession of the land and sell it. A key issue is whether the bank knew about those mortgages and liens before it loaned money to Irish American, a Dublin group led by Patrick Kelly.

"What did the bank know, and when did it know it?," attorney Steven Hutton, who represents Gareau partnership Bussoleno Ltd., said in court Monday.

Bussoleno, a Virgin Islands company, claims it has a $5.7 million claim that could supersede the bank's interest.

But attorney David Boyette, who represents the bank, countered that he would show that Bussoleno and Sarasota Quay U.S. Partnership, a Fenton partnership that also has an unrecorded mortgage, were aware they held subordinate positions to the bank's.

Though the bank hopes to eventually sell the tract, land experts say it would likely fetch about $20 million -- a fraction of its peak value in 2006. Millions of dollars of infrastructure work also would be required before vertical construction could begin.

Hutton also is asking Sarasota Circuit Court Judge Charles Williams to order the property sold in multiple parcels and not as one piece. Bussoleno and Sarasota Quay have claims on different parcels, he said, and a piecemeal sale could generate more money.

Irish American's proposed Sarasota Bayside project was designed to include 700 pricey condos, a 175-unit hotel, more than 100,000 square feet of retail space for restaurants and shops, and 39,000 square feet of offices.

The old Sarasota Quay, built in 1985, was razed in 2007. Gareau testified that he had received $5.7 million in "consulting fees" for two of the land purchases, which also included money for his property management and for bringing in the Irish buyers.

He also said that Kelly, who hired Gareau's son, Jeffrey, to be a local Irish American executive after the younger Gareau's Quay restaurant closed, provided him with a $2 million loan that was interest-free and on a verbal basis.

Hutton, though, said Kelly spent money from his Anglo-Irish Bank loans on such things as large donations to an Irish college, which was headed by a relative of the bank's president, and to the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall.

He also blamed the bank for a lack of oversight.

"This bank treated these borrowers in a very cozy way, and had a lax way of lending money," Hutton said.

Kelly took out several loans to buy the property in pieces beginning in late 2003. In March he stipulated that with interest, he now owes about $110 million on those loans.

The non-jury trial before Judge Williams is scheduled to resume this morning at 9 a.m.

[Admin]

Published: Friday, January 10, 2014

SARASOTA - A decade after plans for a $1 billion complex were unveiled but failed to materialize, the former site of the Sarasota Quay has drawn significant interest from at least one potential buyer.

But with a dozen hotels and condominium towers already being planned nearby — and upscale commercial developments like the Mall at University Town Center set to pull in shoppers — industry watchers don't see construction as imminent.

Instead, the new owners of the 15-acre bayfront site will likely either flip the land or roll out development incrementally, real estate experts say.

“A large portion of the retail space that was once proposed there is no longer viable there, given other developments, but I think a number of restaurants would still be very interested,” said Brett Hutchens, chief executive of Casto Lifestyle Properties, a local development firm that built the Whole Foods Market Centre in downtown Sarasota and was a partner in the $1 billion plan in 2004.

“But luxury or very high-end retail stores there are no likely at this juncture.”

In the eyes of area officials, a possible deal with Jacksonville-based GreenPointe Holdings LLC represents major progress for one of the most coveted properties along the Gulf Coast of Florida.

They believe a rekindled development plan could be the missing link that fully joins downtown with the Cultural and Rosemary districts — and perhaps jumpstarts redevelopment of North Tamiami Trail.

“This is one of those rare times in a community's history when you can look at that whole area and think a little bigger,” said Virginia Haley, president of Visit Sarasota County, the local tourism marketing agency. “It represents something that will be so significant for our region.”

GreenPointe's chief executive said that nothing is final, but he confirmed the company is interested in the property, following a report in Friday's Herald-Tribune.

“We don't have an agreement on it yet, but we hope to have something soon,” said Edward Burr, the company's president and CEO. “We don't have any firms plans for it at this time. It's still too early in the process.”

The Quay property hit the market last summer after a four-year saga, when the Irish government — acting as receiver for the defunct Anglo-Irish Bank — foreclosed on the tract.

A Dublin developer had defaulted on roughly $100 million in debt tied to the land.

A Miami brokerage marketing the site is asking $40 million.

Built in 1985, the Quay was once home to a nightclub, a Japanese restaurant and a clothing boutique. But the aging complex was razed in 2007 to make way for Irish-American Management Services' grand vision of a mixed-use community.

Irish-American planned nearly 700 luxury condos, a 175-unit hotel, and about 140,000 square feet of restaurants, shops, and offices there.

Like many projects of its kind, those plans faltered with the onset of the Great Recession.

If GreenPointe moves forward, observers expect a similar mix.

“I'm hoping they give a comprehensive look to the entire region — from the Ritz-Carlton to 10th Street,” said Ian Black, who owns a commercial real estate brokerage in Sarasota. “It's one of the most significant opportunities in Florida — if not the entire country right now.”

Competition has grown more intense since Irish-American sought city approvals for its plan.

Developments like the Mall at University Town Center — a $315 million complex scheduled to open in October — and expansions along University Parkway and into Lakewood Ranch have pushed consumer traffic east.

Closer to Sarasota, nearly a dozen other new condo and hotel developments in and around downtown also are poised to break ground — competition for the Quay.

But what most consider the biggest hurdle the property faces is the roughly $30 million in infrastructure that developers would have to install before a single residence, hotel room or shop could be built.

Commercial real estate specialists expect to see demand for the space, especially among hoteliers.

“There's going to be a lot of hotel chains that clamor to get on that site,” said Barry Seidel, president and founder of American Property Group of Sarasota Inc. “For the money they will end up paying, it has to be high-end. But this could become the focal point of Sarasota.”

Whoever buys the Quay site may find tough competition for condo buyers.

Sales on downtown condos this year have risen to their highest level since the housing slump. But there is still about a year's worth of inventory on the market for luxury residences priced at about $1.2 million, Realtor records show.

Already, there are nearly 300 condo units proposed for downtown and Longboat Key.

“We have all these new communities coming out that will be $1 million or more,” said Pam Charron, a downtown condo specialist with Michael Saunders & Co. “There's a lot of interest, but it will depend on the timing of when they come to market whether we will be able to support them.”

New development at the Quay — if and when it comes — will almost certainly resurrect talk of traffic congestion along one of the busiest corridors in Sarasota, too.

Development plans for a Weston hotel and 144-unit condo tower dubbed The Vue near the Quay site already have stirred concern among nearby residents, who fear the strain on their roadways.

Questions, too, are being raised about the fate of a long-planned traffic roundabout at U.S. 41 and Fruitville Road, and whether new development would be compatible with it.

Developers say the key to the long-term success will be moving forward at a pace that doesn't flood the market or overburden the roads.

Phasing a project in over several years, and diversifying the offerings there, would help assure absorption, said Larry Lieberman, a Sarasota multifamily developer.

“The bayfront in Sarasota is one of those markets that will expand to fit the amount of product,” Lieberman said. The Quay is “probably the most attractive property around.”

[Admin]

1992 Anglo Irish director and 15 per cent shareholder John Clegg is forced to resign following British newspaper reports that he may have been involved in money-laundering for the IRA.

Sept 17 2000

The UK Department of Trade & Industry has just completed a near decade-long investigation into the affairs of the Clegg family and their suspicious share dealings. The probe took the two inspectors, Anthony Robertshaw and Christopher Mayhew, from Dublin to Chicago, from South Africa to North London as they unraveled a web of complex financial transactions.

The London Stock Exchange began to investigate share dealings in a struggling engineering firm, Wace Holdings, in 1990. Details of an alleged insider dealing ring had been uncovered by the exchange's surveillance section and passed on to other enforcement and security agencies. At the time, it was suspected that the dealings were some sort of financing operation for the IRA.

Evidence uncovered led to the appointment of two DTI inspectors to carry out a fullscale inquiry into the Cleggs' dealings.

The report reveals that the various share transactions involved names "scattered through an extensive family tree".

The inspectors believe that the principal participants were initially the elderly Albert Clegg, also known as Albert Conroy, and his twin brother John Henry Clegg. However, from about 1983 onwards, they believe that "Mr John Michael Clegg (John Henry's son) knew, encouraged, benefited and actively participated in these operations".

John Michael Clegg is a former nonexecutive director of Anglo Irish Bank.

At one point, the Clegg family were the largest shareholders in the Dublin bank.

Their share dealings included a 4.7% stake bought through Irish stockbroking firm Porter & Irvine in UK specialist printing firm Tinsley Robor under the name of Harold Staniforth in March 1990.

In November 1989, some 2.5% of Wace's rival, Parkway, was acquired.

The shares were registered at a Clegg address. The company was later taken over by Wace. However, a series of unfortunate fires at the house destroyed some of the Cleggs' records.

[Admin]

False passports, twins impersonating each other, the dead buying shares... it's not fiction but a DTI report on John Clegg's Wace.
Sunday 10 September 2000

He was the golden boy who could do no wrong. Over eight years, from the age of only 25, John Michael Clegg built Wace from a near-bankrupt stock market shell into the world's biggest provider of pre-press photographic and design services to the advertising and media industries. Until January 1992, that is, when the fast-talking City whizz kid quit abruptly, blaming wild rumours about his alleged links with the IRA for destabilising the company.

Clegg firmly denied terrorist connections. But the authorities had taken the talk seriously enough to convene a secret meeting at the Stock Exchange the previous summer. Present were representatives from the Royal Ulster Constabulary's C13 anti-racketeering squad, the Serious Fraud Office, the Bank of England and the exchange's own insider dealing unit.

The inquiry, however, was shelved and no evidence found to back up the gossip.

The truth about Clegg and some of his family's murky dealings has now finally been revealed, after an eight-and-a-half year inquiry by the Department of Trade and Industry. Stretching to 300 pages, the DTI's report tells a tale of fraud, lies, deception, insider dealing, forgery and fake bank accounts. The story is a cocktail of high stakes finance and slapstick farce. And the biggest surprise is not that after all this time no further action is likely, but that the book on Wace was not closed sooner.

Clegg, his father John Henry and uncle Albert - the three villains of the piece - had long since skipped abroad, their whereabouts unknown. In all, the DTI inspectors say they used no fewer than 29 aliases for secret wheeler-dealing in Wace and its takeover targets, Parkway, European Colour and Tinsley Robor.

Members of the extended Clegg family across three continents piled into the shares - so many of them, indeed, that it quickly became a standing joke in the boardroom. One ex-Wace director said it was a tradition to ask: 'Come on John, who is this one?' Clegg's invariable response was: 'I am sorry, but I have a lot of relations.'

The trio ruthlessly booked deals in the names of their relatives, several of whom had no idea that their names were being used. A two-month-old baby, long dead acquain tances and non-existent associates were among the characters to turn up on share registers, in offshore bank accounts and on a confetti of fake documents. Wace's advisers and the trio's numerous bankers were hoodwinked, said the DTI, which cleared them of any complicity.

'Mr J M Clegg was an extremely convincing individual whose subsequent domination of the Wace board increased in proportion with the company's spectacular growth by acquisition into a major plc,' the inspectors concluded.

'Most notably we believe he benefited from substantial secret dealings in the shares of Wace, European Colour, Tinsley Robor and Parkway through bank accounts in his name at Credit Suisse and... with Anglo Irish Bank.'

Clegg's first involvement with Wace was based on a lie. Casting around for a shell company, he and his father lighted on the struggling firm in 1983. Their initial £270,000 investment, they said, came from a wealthy cousin of Clegg's in South Africa.

In fact, she was Clegg's half-sister, Jayne Wright, a 19-year-old love child from an affair his father had in the mid-Sixties. The money, it is believed, came from the sale of a ragbag of properties the Cleggs owned in Sheffield. Clegg barely knew Wright and she had, the inspectors found, no idea of the secret deals in her name.

Nor, later on, had her husband and baby daughter, whose names were also used. The marriage collapsed under the strain of the revelations. But, with poetic justice, in 1993 she sued for control of accounts and properties in her name, robbing Clegg and his father of £10 million of their ill-gotten gains.

Clegg's whole life, indeed, may have been a cruel deception. Born on a holiday in Nice in 1958, he was christened William - the name later used on the Anglo Irish Bank account for many of his share deals.

A month later, at the British consulate in Marseilles, his father registered a new name. The reason, said witnesses, was not just that his wife wanted John, but that her sister was Clegg's real mother. Clegg, meanwhile, was 'astonished' to hear of the first birth certificate. The inspectors concluded drily: 'Clearly we are not in a position to say who the parents of Mr J M Clegg are.'

Clegg's father and uncle had an equally colourful background. Identical twins, they were born in Sheffield in 1919, the sons of a bookmaker turned property developer, and both had been bankrupted by the Inland Revenue. They would regularly impersonate one another. 'They operate false passports ... they can shuffle them up like playing cards,' one witness said.

In the Sixties, the twins first punted on the stock market and ran their own firm, South Yorkshire Motor Insurance, which was wound up by the DTI in 1967. That set alarm bells ringing early at Wace, but it was young Clegg, after all, who was on the board, and the directors comforted themselves with his training as a solicitor at respected City law firm, Nabarro Nathanson.

In fact both his father and uncle quickly and secretly moved into Wace. Using the aliases Michael and Albert Clark, and operating as Geoffrey's Securities Services, they were first handed the wages collection contract. Father and son advised the board on deals. The directors had no idea of the connection.

Albert, too, had the run of the place as Wace's janitor, gaining the nickname 'Uncle Geoffrey'. They were 'like two peas in a pod', said company secretary Finlay Scott Ritchie. 'You could only tell who was who by the fact that one usually saw Michael Clark in a suit and Uncle Geoffrey was usually in a mess.'

Wace expanded rapidly by acquisition. Nevertheless, and entirely unknown to the outside world, Clegg family members and friends at one point owned more than 40 per cent of the company. Clegg's failure to disclose such dealings repeatedly misled investors and broke the law, the inspectors found.

In 1986, the Clegg trio unsuccessfully tried to pressurise European Colour, an inkmaker, into a deal. They spread false rumours in the market, the DTI found, built up a large secret stake and, using aliases, the twins heckled the European Colour board at its annual meeting.

The pattern was repeated from 1988 to 1990 at the print and packaging group Tinsley Robor, where Wace and certain members of Clegg's family built up a 25 per cent stake. One of the aliases used to hide the buying was Harold Staniforth, someone the twins had known during their childhood in Sheffield but who had died in 1930 at age 11.

As Staniforth, in reality Uncle Albert, was then being hunted by private detectives working for the retail broker Sharelink to recover a debt it was hardly surprising when Clegg mused that it was 'not the most suitable name' to have used. This did not prevent Clegg from vouching for the long-dead 'Staniforth'. 'We can only surmise how, 58 years after Mr H Staniforth died, Mr J M Clegg claimed to the Wace board to have met him,' the inspectors wrote.

By 1990, Wace had turned its guns on Parkway, its main rival, which had hit serious financial trouble. After long and tortuous negotiations, Wace clinched the deal for £11m that August. Once again the Clegg trio built up a large undeclared stake. In all, Wace and Clegg family members owned 17.8 per cent of Parkway. 'As the tempo built up in the takeover discussions... so did the purchases of shares in Parkway by certain members of the Clegg family,' the DTI inspectors said.

'If the true facts had been publicly available in 1990, this would have led to Mr J M Clegg's immediate removal from the Wace board and the possible abandonment of the proposed takeover.'

This time the secret stakebuilding did raise alarm bells at Wace's advisers, BZW. The Wace board, too, finally pressed the issue, employing a private detective to gather evidence. Wace's dossier was handed to the DTI in early 1992, and within weeks the inspectors were appointed.

The market at last sensed a scandal. Wace's shares plunged in value by 40 per cent after the Parkway deal. The Clegg trio, however, had already secretly made their escape. While possessing all the inside information, they had illicitly offloaded most of their Wace shares for £7m during the Parkway talks.

[Admin]

Chequered past catching up with lender after 44 years
GEORGE GARVEY – UPDATED 02 DECEMBER 2012

THIS weekend's dramatic recapitalisation almost certainly marks the final chapter in the 44-year history of Anglo Irish Bank.

After ascending the dizzy heights during the Celtic Tiger years with a peak market value of €13.3bn at the beginning of June 2007, Anglo now looks set to disappear.

Anglo was founded in 1964. Originally known as the City of Dublin Bank, one of the bank's founders was solicitor Howard Robinson, the father-in-law of former President Mary Robinson.

City of Dublin started life as a small deposit-taker and lender. Although its shares were floated on the Irish Stock Exchange as long ago as 1971 it stayed small for the next two decades.

By 1986, City of Dublin was losing money. With the Irish economy mired in deep recession it seemed that it would only be a matter of time before the bank was gobbled up by a larger competitor. Indeed, ever since Ken Bates's Irish Trust Bank went bust in 1974, the Central Bank had been "encouraging" smaller Irish banks to merge with or be taken over by larger outfits.

To most observers it seemed only a matter of time before City of Dublin went the same way as the other Irish mini-banks of the 1970s and 1980s.

It almost did. In 1986, all that was standing between City of Dublin and oblivion was its profitable subsidiary, Anglo Irish Bank, and its boss, a then 38-year-old chartered accountant called Sean Fitzpatrick. The City of Dublin board appointed Fitzpatrick as chief executive of the entire group, which was promptly renamed Anglo Irish Bank.

Thus began a 22-year roller-coaster ride without parallel in Irish financial history.

Fitzpatrick's reign as Anglo Irish chief executive almost came to a premature end in 1992 when John Clegg, who had a 20pc stake in Anglo and was also a director of the bank, was forced to resign in sensational circumstances.

While contemporary newspaper reports alleging that Clegg was linked to the IRA proved to be unfounded, a subsequent investigation by the UK's Department of Trade and Industry showed that Clegg had engaged in massive insider trading while chief executive of quoted print services company Wace.

However, in a deft display of corporate footwork, Fitzpatrick managed to manoeuvre Clegg off the Anglo board and arranged for his shareholding in the bank to be sold to institutional investors. Fitzpatrick emerged from what had been a potentially very damaging affair with his reputation enhanced.

Over the following decade Anglo rode the Celtic Tiger. Its share price, which was still under €1 in 1997, had soared to €17.53 by mid-2007, valuing Anglo at a scarcely credible €13.3bn.

Even at the peak of its apparent success the questions about Anglo never quite went away. It never published a meaningful sectoral breakdown of the make-up of its loan book.

Its better-established rivals muttered darkly about its excessive dependence on an overheated property market, that it had become too close for comfort to certain property developers.

Then in August 2007 the credit crunch struck and the world changed forever as the era of abundant, cheap money came to an end. Suddenly investors, depositors and other banks were no longer prepared to give Anglo the benefit of the doubt. Matters weren't helped by the bank's failure to fully explain its relationship with Sean Quinn, who has lost at least €1bn on his 15pc stake.

The markets became ever more concerned about Anglo's lending to builders and property developers. With virtually all of its €72bn loan book tied up in bricks and mortar, the market was convinced that Anglo wasn't making adequate provision for bad debts.

When earlier this month Anglo announced that it was providing an extra €500m for bad debts in its results for the 12 months to September 2008 and that it expected to provide a further €1.7bn to €2.5bn over the next three years, investors dumped the shares. The actual bad debt figure will almost certainly be much higher.

The Anglo share price collapsed, ending last Friday at 27c, a mere 1.5pc of its peak €17.53 price just 18 months ago. Indeed, if it weren't for the Government's blanket guarantee for bank deposits and bonds of last September it is difficult to see how Anglo could have survived this long.

While last night's announcement temporarily prevents Anglo from going bust, the sensational developments of the past few days have destroyed any lingering hopes it may have had of surviving as an independent institution.

[Admin]

John McCabe ran McCabe Builders which he founded in 1972 and lived on a farm in Meath formerly owned by Charles Haughey. He often partnered with Paddy Kelly.

Charles Haughey was thrice Taoiseach of Ireland and had IRA ties.

The Arms Crisis or Arms Trial was a political scandal in the Republic of Ireland in 1970, when two cabinet ministers — Charles Haughey and Neil Blaney — were removed from office for allegedly attempting to illegally import arms for the Irish Republican Army in Northern Ireland.

Haughey was generally seen as coming from the pragmatist wing of the party, and was not believed to have strong opinions on the matter, despite having family links with Derry. Indeed many presumed that he had a strong antipathy to physical force Irish republicanism; during his period as Minister for Justice he had followed a tough anti-IRA line, including using internment without trial against the IRA. The hawks in the cabinet were seen as Kevin Boland and Neil Blaney, both sons of founding fathers in the party with strong Old IRA pasts.

A government fund of £100,000 was set up to provide relief to nationalist civilians forced out of their homes by the Troubles, and Haughey was given sole authority over this money. Ministers Haughey and Blaney disapproved of the cautious policies of Taoiseach Lynch on Northern Ireland and favoured a more robust approach.

In October 1969, a meeting of Northern Citizen Defence Committees, which had been set up to defend Republican areas form Unionist attack and which included IRA officers, was held in Bailieboro, County Cavan, with Irish army intelligence officer Captain James Kelly in attendance. The meeting was told that £50,000 would be made available to buy weapons for defence of nationalist areas against loyalist attack. Haughey even met with the IRA Chief of Staff Cathal Goulding. The Minister for Justice Micheál Ó Móráin reported this meeting to the Cabinet, but Haughey dismissed it as a chance encounter.

Neil Blaney allegedly made plans with Captain James Kelly to import weapons from continental Europe. Haughey provided the money for the purchase from his civilian relief fund, and also tried to arrange customs clearance for the shipment.

There was general surprise when, in an incident known as the Arms Crisis, Haughey, along with Blaney, was sacked from Lynch's cabinet amid allegations of the use of the funds to import arms for use by the IRA. Opposition leader Liam Cosgrave was informed by the Garda that a plot to import arms existed and included government members. Cosgrave told Lynch he knew of the plot and would announce it in the Dáil next day if he didn't act. Lynch requested Haughey and Blaney submit their resignations to the President. Both men refused, saying they did nothing illegal.

Haughey and Blaney were subsequently tried in court along with an army Officer, Captain James Kelly, and Albert Luykx, a former Flemish National Socialist and businessman, who allegedly used his contacts to buy the arms. After trial all the accused were acquitted but many refused to recognise the verdict of the courts. Although cleared of wrongdoing, it looked as if Haughey's political career was finished. Blaney and Boland eventually resigned from Fianna Fáil but Haughey remained. He spent his years on the backbenches – the wilderness years – building support within the grassroots of the party,

[Admin]

Albert Luykx was a Flemish businessman and former Nazi.

He was born in Belgium to a family of furniture makers. Following the invasion of Belgium, the Luykx family, like most furniture makers during the Nazi occupation, made barracks for the occupying forces. Soon after the occupation, Luykx joined the 6th SS Volunteer Brigade of the Waffen-SS. After the war, he was captured and sentenced to death by the Belgian authorities, though the sentence was later commuted to 20 years imprisonment.

He escaped in 1948 and, with the aid of Trappist monks and the Catholic Church, fled to the Netherlands where, using false identity papers, he acquired a valid Dutch passport in the name of Franciscus Josef Faes. Then he traveled to the Republic of Ireland. He was granted political asylum in Ireland by the Minister for Justice Gerald Boland, though after the Arms Crisis, there were heated questions in the Dáil in 1971 about the admission of a foreigner who had been sentenced to death for Nazi collaboration and the fact he was granted Irish citizenship by the Minister for Justice James Everett in 1954.

He ran numerous restaurants and bars in Ireland, finally buying the old Jameson family home, Sutton House, on Shielmartin Road in Sutton, Dublin. Luykx raised Fallow Deer on the grounds, which he acquired from Dublin County Council, who were planning a partial cull of the Fallow Deer herd in the Phoenix Park. Sutton House later became Sutton House Hotel and was run by Luykx's son-in-law, while Luykx built a family home and a factory on the grounds. He had two sons and four daughters.

He became friendly with figures such as Charles Haughey. In 1971 it is alleged that he was asked by Charles Haughey and Neil Blaney to acquire arms with the intention of arming the Irish Republican Army. Luykx was subsequently tried in the resulting Arms Crisis. He was acquitted.

Following his death, his family home was sold to Neil Blaney.

The eldest of a family of eleven, Blaney's father Neal had been a commander of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in Donegal during the War of Independence and the Civil War. He served as both a TD and as a Senator between 1927 and 1948. It was from his father that Blaney got his strong republican views and his first introduction to politics.

[Admin]

The Anglo Irish Bank hidden loans controversy (also known as the circular transactions controversy) began in Dublin in December 2008 when Seán FitzPatrick, the chairman of Anglo Irish Bank (the state's third-largest bank), admitted he had hidden a total of €87 million in loans from the bank, triggering a series of incidents which led to the eventual nationalisation of Anglo on 21 January 2009. FitzPatrick subsequently resigned his position and was followed within twenty-four hours by the bank's non-executive director, Lar Bradshaw and chief executive, David Drumm.

On 7 January 2009, another director, Willie McAteer, resigned, becoming the fourth casualty of the controversy. Two days later the Financial Regulator Patrick Neary retired amidst much criticism over his handling of the affair.

Within days of the initial admission, an announcement was made that Anglo Irish Bank would be one of three (alongside Allied Irish Bank and Bank of Ireland) that would be recapitalised by the Irish government. Taoiseach Brian Cowen denied claims that he was protecting a "Golden Circle" of wealthy financiers from being identified. This mysterious group of ten businessmen is said to have received loans from Anglo Irish Bank in return for buying shares, in a move designed to keep the bank afloat.

The Financial Regulator first uncovered the €87 million loans in January 2008 when inspectors from the regulator's offices carried out an inspection into the loan book of rival lender, Irish Nationwide Building Society. The inspectors noticed that a large loan was provided to FitzPatrick at Anglo Irish Bank and later repaid. The Regulator discovered at a later date that similar loans were provided to FitzPatrick in September 2008 and repaid by him in October 2008. When the issue was raised with Anglo Irish Bank it was discovered that there were further loans between the two banks over an extended period of eight years.

On 17 February, Taoiseach Brian Cowen informed Dáil Éireann of his knowledge of a group of ten wealthy businessmen who had come together to buy shares in Anglo Irish Bank in 2008 in a transaction which is now at the centre of an investigation by the Office of Corporate Enforcement. Cowen has since denied suggestions put forth by the Opposition that he was attempting to protect anyone involved in this so-called "Golden Circle"

[Admin]

The 'Maple 10', also known as the Anglo 10 or the Golden Circle, was a group of Irish investors. The Maple 10 includes Gerry Gannon, Seamus Ross, John McCabe, Paddy McKillen, Jerry Conlan, Joe O’Reilly, Patrick Kearney, Brian O’Farrell, Gerry Maguire and Sean Reilly

[Admin]

McCABE DEAL CONFIRMED AS NEVER DONE.

June 24, 2011: In an article published today in New Zealand National Business Review, reporter Matt Nippert revealed that "inside sources" from WGA confirmed that WGA had never settled any deals. One former WGA staffer, who said she could not be named because of a draconian confidentiality agreement stipulating $US1 million in penalties, told NBR the source believed the loan business was a scam.

“I am not aware of any loan that has been settled. Even after Irish firm McCabe Builders announced its agreement with WGA in late 2009, both John McCabe senior and junior were flying in to see Ali on a frequent basis – always with a desperate expression in their faces.” According to Irish news reports last month, McCabe did not receive its loan. The whistleblower said about 15 new clients would visit WGA’s office each month, mostly from Australia but also Germany and Russia.


McCabe deal proves to be another lie from Ali Syed and Western Gulf Advisory
The following is from The Sunday Business Post On Line, dated May 8, 2011 by Gavin Daly.

McCabe Builders, one of the country’s biggest building firms, has said it is confident the National Asset Management Agency (Nama) will support its business plans, despite the firm losing almost €90 million in two years. After a €60 million writedown on its work-in-progress and investments, the firm made a loss of €73.5 million in the 12 months to the end of August 2009, according to new figures. In the previous financial year, McCabe Builders lost more than €16 million.

Despite the collapse of the property sector, turnover at J&M McCabe Properties, the main holding company, rose by €4 million to €98.3 million in the 2008/09 financial year. The firm reduced its bank debt to €159million during the year, down from €200 million in 2008. The directors of the company noted that its borrowings had been transferred to Nama and said the support of the state agency was ‘‘a key assumption’’ underlining its ability to continue to trade.

‘‘The directors are confident that, following negotiations with Nama, the group’s business plans will be approved and that support will enable the group to trade through the current difficult market conditions," according to the accounts, which were signed on March 23.

The firm is owned by John and Mary McCabe and has been active mainly in the greater Dublin area. Its projects included the Abingdon housing estate in Malahide in north Dublin, as well as hotels, office blocks and commercial units. It has also completed a number of public projects, including the Heritage Centre in the Phoenix Park.

Despite the write-down in the value of the assets, the directors of the company said their properties were well-located and were ‘‘likely to be early beneficiaries of a recovery in the market’’ in the future.

‘‘The directors are confident that a positive market sentiment will return in the next number of years," they said.

Last July, the firm said it had agreed a debt-for-equity swap with Western Gulf Advisory (WGA), a Swiss-based investment fund. WGA was given an option to acquire a 50 per cent stake in McCabe Builders and was to take on its debts. WGA was also to provide £40 million for the firm to complete projects in Britain. However, last November, the company stopped work on a number of sites in London as it waited for Nama to approve its funding proposals.

The company did not return calls for comment last week. The new accounts show that Anglo Irish Bank had a number of charges over company assets.

Bank of Ireland had a charge over the assets of McCabe Builders and McCabe Builders (Dublin), as well as letters of guarantee signed by the directors.

The four directors of McCabe Builders shared €1.2 million in pay and pension contributions in the August 2009 financial year, on top of almost €965,000 the previous year. The firm had 105 staff, down from 154, and its wage bill was halved to €5.4 million.