A Greek shipowner was behind an elaborate fraud plan in 2011 to set fire to his own tanker off the coast of Yemen to collect $77 million in insurance, according to a High Court judge in London.
Judge Nigel Teare said Marios Iliopoulos, who is now the chief executive of Greek ferry company Seajets, coaxed the Brillante Virtuoso’s captain, the engineer, several Yemeni coast guard members and a Greek salvage company to torch the vessel.
“I do not consider that there is a plausible explanation of the events which befell Brillante Virtuoso which is consistent with an innocent explanation,” Judge Teare said late Monday in a ruling that denies insurance payments over the fire. “I have found that in the present case a group of armed men, on the instructions of the owner, were permitted to board the vessel and set fire to it as part of an attempt by the owner to defraud the underwriters.”
The judgment in the case, which is still being investigated, comes after Greece’s Piraeus Bank, the vessel’s mortgage holder, claimed losses over the fire damage from the ship’s insurers.
The ruling also ends years of legal claims by Suez Fortune Investments, the tanker’s operator which was linked to Mr. Iliopoulos, to force the insurers to pay out.
Mr. Iliopoulos, who wasn’t present at court, and the insurers weren’t immediately available for comment. The Greek salvage company, Poseidon Salvage International, and the Yemeni coast guard couldn’t be reached for comment. The ship’s captain and engineer weren’t identified in court papers.
The bogus pirate attack included seven masked, armed assailants posing as security contractors who boarded the Brillante Virtuoso near Aden, Yemen, on July 6, 2011, according to court filings.
According to the court papers, the men fired shots on the bridge and detonated an explosive device in the fuel purifier room, starting a fire which spread to the engine room with the use of fire accelerants.
The assailants then left the ship and an officer at the bridge called a nearby U.S. Navy cruiser, the USS Philippine Sea, for help. The crew was evacuated and the Poseidon salvage company was called in to fight the blaze. But the fire became stronger and the ship was declared a total loss.
The judge said it was “extraordinary” that the captain would allow armed men aboard and that Poseidon was allegedly responsible for the resurgence of the fire. The engineer was also accused of not following firefighting procedures like shutting down air vents and fuel pipes.
Judge Teare said that some “parts of the canvas remain blank” to directly link Mr. Iliopoulos to the plan to set the tanker on fire.
The court heard testimony that the ship had an operating loss of around $10 million between 2009 and 2011 and by the time of the incident Mr. Iliopoulos was late in paying crew wages, fuel supplies and insurance.
“Mr. Iliopoulos had a motive to want the vessel to be damaged by fire, namely, the making of a fraudulent claim for the total loss of the vessel in the sum of some $77 million which, if successful, would solve the serious financial difficulties in which he and his companies were at the time,” Judge Teare said.
The underwriting group included Hiscox Dedicated Corporate Member, Talbot Underwriting, QBE Corporate, Chaucer Corporate Capital, GAI Indemnity, Markel Capital, Catlin Syndicate and Novae Corporate Underwriting.
People with knowledge of the matter said Piraeus Bank will now try to recover the money for the mortgage from Mr. Iliopoulos’s assets in Greece.