US moves to takeover Aluko’s former $22m mansion

The U.S. is making moves to confiscate a $22 million Los Angeles mansion which used to belong to Nigerian businessman Kolawole Aluko.

Aluko has been accused of taking part in a massive government bribery scheme in Nigeria involving energy contracts that generated more than $1.5 billion in revenue.

The 15,000-square-foot, six-bedroom Bel Air property was sold by Aluko in 2016 to Sarbonne Estate Inc., or SEI, which is controlled by a private-jet entrepreneur who isn’t accused of playing any role in the Nigerian scandal?

Initially, the Justice Department described SEI’s owner as a non-U.S. national who owns an aircraft services company and was a “close business associate” of Aluko.

However, SEI, in court filings, declared that it’s owned by a person whose business provides “global aviation services to high and ultra-high net worth clients.”

Last week, in its legal fight with the government, SEI filed a disclosure listing Thomas Flohr as the sole owner of the company, which he controls through an entity registered in the British Virgin Islands. Thomas Flohr is the name of the Swiss founder and chairman of VistaJet Group Holding Ltd.

In a civil lawsuit the U.S. filed in July to seize the Bel Air property, 755 Sarbonne Road, the government alleges that the buyer should have known the mansion would be subject to forfeiture because of an existing relationship with Aluko and news articles reporting that the Nigerian businessman was suspected of money laundering.

Aluko transferred the property to SEI in order to repay a $21.6 million debt he owed to another Flohr company, under a contract granting him “exclusive, owner-like access” to a Bombardier Global 6000 aircraft for 3 1/2 years starting in mid-2015, SEI told the court.

Instead of making the required lump sum payment, the parties agreed he could “settle the outstanding debt” with the transfer of the mansion in April 2016, it said.

SEI in its filings insisted that Flohr understood Aluko to be a man of legitimate means and had no reason to believe the businessman had acquired the property with ill-gotten gains.

At the time, Flohr “did not reasonably have cause to believe” that Aluko had acquired the property “using funds traceable to any crime giving rise to potential forfeiture,” SEI said. He understood Aluko to be “a very wealthy executive” capable of purchasing the real estate “from legitimate sources,” it said.

SEI said that it wants to sell the home but that the U.S. has threatened criminal prosecution if it does.