U.K. Judge Freezes Homes Worth $100 Million to Probe Ownership

(Bloomberg) -- A U.K. court froze the ownership of three London residential properties worth 80 million pounds ($101 million) linked to a high-profile suspect, while investigators scrutinize the source of the funds used to buy the assets.

A High Court judge last week granted the National Crime Agency, the U.K. equivalent to the FBI, so-called unexplained wealth orders on the properties in prime locations, the agency said Wednesday in a statement. The assets are held by offshore companies and connected with an official in a foreign country.

UWOs, which became law a year ago, mean that the police no longer have to prove that an asset above the value of 50,000 pounds was obtained illegally before blocking it from being liquidated. Instead, the onus is on the owner to show that the funds used to purchase the property were legitimate.

“The purchase of prime property in London is a tactic used to launder money and we will use all the powers available to us to target those who try to do this," said Graeme Biggar, director general of the National Economic Crime Centre, a seven-month-old body set up to coordinate the fight against economic crime. "Our aim is to prevent misuse of the U.K.’s financial structures which undermines the integrity of the U.K.’s economy and institutions."

This is only the second time UWOs have been secured. The first was in February 2018, when a judge ordered that former International Bank of Azerbaijan head Jahangir Hajiyev and his wife explain how they afforded a pair of properties worth 22 million pounds. Both deny any wrongdoing.

Campaign group Global Witness welcomed the order, but in a statement called for the implementation of a public-property register, saying that it believes roughly 100 billion pounds worth of property in England and Wales were bought with suspicious means.

To contact the reporter on this story: Franz Wild in London at fwild@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Anthony Aarons at aaarons@bloomberg.net, Christopher Elser, Peter Chapman

©2019 Bloomberg L.P.