Six investors, including professional golfer Des Smyth, are prepared to issue an order for the attachment and committal of an Irish businessman if he does not make full disclosure of his assets, the High Court heard yesterday.
Mr Charles Meenan SC, for Mr Smyth and the other investors, who are seeking the recovery of almost €700,000 from Mr Thomas O'Keeffe, The Sweepstakes, Ballsbridge, Dublin, said his clients were "very concerned" as a result of information they had received when investigating Mr O'Keeffe's assets.
Mr O'Keeffe has already served a two-week jail term for contempt of court over not complying with orders directing him to provide information about large sums of money he was given to invest.
In April the High Court ordered his arrest after he failed to appear to answer questions in connection with his handling of such monies. The court also appointed Mr James McGillion, a solicitor at L.K. Shields and Partners, as receiver over Mr O'Keeffe's assets.
Last month, the court was told by Mr John Trainor SC, for an American businessman, Mr John O'Neill, that Mr O'Neill had handed over $5 million (€5.13 million) to Mr O'Keeffe to invest and Mr O'Keeffe had furnished a statement of his business affairs.
The receiver said that it appeared Mr O'Keeffe had caused 400,000 shares in HTTP Technologies Inc to be bought using some of Mr O'Neill's monies.
The shares were subsequently registered by Mr O'Keeffe in the name of Mrs Rachado Dardari, who appeared to be the wife of Mr Majid Dardari, one of two institution managers who had been in the employ of a company with which Mr O'Keeffe was associated, Manro Group International. Mr and Mrs Dardari were refusing to return the share certificates to Mr O'Keeffe.
Yesterday, Mr Justice Murphy continued an interim injunction restraining the Dardaris from dealing in the shares until after a further court hearing on October 7th. He also gave permission to the receiver to submit documents to the Swiss authorities to enable the receiver to pursue his claim against the Dardaris.
Mr Meenan said his clients were concerned that, even at this stage of the proceedings, Mr O'Keeffe was not making full disclosure of his assets. When they examined an account of Mr O'Keeffe in Lloyds TSB containing $6,146, they also discovered another item, Money Market Instruments 104,644. They did not know to what this referred.
Mr Meenan said Mr O'Keeffe had listed three accounts in the Hong Kong Shanghai Bank Corporation. When lawyers contacted that bank, a further seven accounts showed up. There was not an awful lot of money in those accounts, but there had to be an explanation as to why they were not revealed, counsel said. There was one entry in an account for $65,000 and a subsequent debit of $60,000 to AIB. This also required explanation.
It appeared Mr O'Keeffe had not given them "the full story". In those circumstances they would be seeking to issue a motion for Mr O'Keeffe's attachment and committal to prison.
Mr O'Keeffe said he was still trying to check out the Lloyds' matter and was awaiting replies. He asked for as much time as possible to make disclosures.
Mr Justice Murphy adjourned the hearing for mention on July 19th.
