A bankruptcy official is eyeing up Sean Dunne’s €700,000 pension after the property developer failed to make payments into his estate.
The former multi-millionaire has claimed he could not afford to comply with a 2018 High Court order requiring him to make monthly payments of €7,000 for a period of 32 months to the Official Assignee in Bankruptcy.
Now lawyers for Official Assignee Michael Ian Larkin have questioned whether the €224,000 owed could be taken from a pension Mr Dunne moved to the UK last year.
Any move to access the pension is set to be resisted by Mr Dunne (66), who says there is a worldwide stay on creditors getting access to it.
The development is the latest twist in the protracted “dual bankruptcy” of the one-time Celtic Tiger developer, who has been subject to bankruptcy processes in both Ireland and the US since 2013.
The Official Assignee issued contempt proceedings against him last year over his failure to make the payments.
However, that application was adjourned after Mr Dunne, who now lives in Surrey, England, filed a motion seeking to vary the bankruptcy payment order.
The hearing opened last December but went “in camera” following an application from the Official Assignee’s counsel Edward Farrelly SC, arising from matters referred to by Mr Dunne in an affidavit.
Mr Justice Richard Humphreys ordered there could be no reporting of the contents of the affidavit.
The hearing finally resumed in public at a virtual court sitting on Monday when details of a pension worth €706,000 were disclosed.
Mr Farrelly told Mr Justice Humphreys information previously provided by Mr Dunne suggested it could not be drawn down until he reached the age of 72.
But he said this condition had now “essentially been dropped” and it appeared the pension could actually be drawn on from the age of 55.
The barrister said there was a suggestion the Official Assignee “can’t get the pension under English law”.
But he said this was “not the point” as a pension is considered assessable income for the purposes of a bankruptcy payments order (BPO) in Ireland.
“The question before the court at the moment is whether it is assessable income for the purposes of reducing the BPO already made,” he said.
Mr Farrelly said that even if there were tax implications from drawing on the pension, whatever would be left over would more than cover the €224,000 owed.
During the hearing, the barrister also accused Mr Dunne of a lack of disclosure regarding his current income and expenditure.
Mr Dunne, who represented himself, rejected the allegation. He said his income when the BPO was made was €13,000 a month and that this was all being expended on legal fees at the time.
Since then, his employment had been terminated and he was now earning just €200 a month. He said he had also been receiving money from his ex-wife, former journalist Gayle Killilea, but this was spent on the upbringing of their children.
Holding up a bank statement supplied to the Official Assignee, he said: “I get my money into my NatWest bank account. I don’t have any other bank account. I don’t have any other credit card.”
Mr Dunne told the judge he fully declared the pension in 2013 and it had been given a worldwide exclusion from his bankruptcy by his US trustee.
“It was only as a very, very last gambit, throw of the dice, that Mr Farrelly and the OA [Official Assignee] came in over the hill at the beginning of last year looking for the pension when I had taken steps to relocate it.”
Before adjourning the matter, Mr Justice Humphreys said he required an unambiguous clarification, ideally via affidavit, on whether Mr Dunne can draw on the pension now.
Source: Irish News
