Sculptures bought fraudulently
Two sculptures gifted to New Zealand by France during the 2011 Rugby World Cup were paid for with stolen money.
The sculptures were installed near the former NZ Rugby headquarters in central Wellington and the Crusaders’ Rugby Park headquarters.
However, the money to pay for them came from unwitting clients of banker Fabien Gaglio, a French fraudster who stole US$100 million (NZ$137m) in a Ponzi scheme.
According to Interest.co.nz, NZ Rugby has known since March 2017 about the sculptures being dragged into Switzerland’s biggest fraud investigation.
Nigel Cass, NZ Rugby’s chief strategy and operations officer, confirmed to Interest.co.nz that they are aware of the allegations.
‘‘We are happy to cooperate fully with any authorities with an interest in this matter. To date we have not been contacted by any authorities about this,’’ he said.
The sculptures form part of a very long list of thefts contained in the case against Gaglio that are currently part of court proceedings in Italy, Switzerland, France and Luxembourg in Europe. Gaglio is facing fraud, forgery, misappropriation of funds and money laundering charges.
Gaglio allegedly created fictitious accounts that duped his clients into believing their investments were prospering. However, he was actually stealing their money and using it to live like a king. His lifestyle at the time was even likened to F. Scott Fitzgerald’s character Jay Gatsby and Jordan Belfort, the Wolf of Wall Street.
But in January 2013, Gaglio walked into a Paris police station, armed with a folder of notes, and confessed to his crimes.
He told a subsequent hearing he had been ‘‘caught in a madness that is hard to explain’’. He had spent everything on lavish holidays, paintings by Andy Warhol and Keith Haring, and private jets. A colleague described his consumption as ‘‘Pharaonic.’’
Gaglio received a five-year jail sentence after his confession which was reduced to four years after he appealed.
However, he has only served one year in a jail in Luxembourg and is currently living with his family in the French Riviera where he is working as an olive farmer.