Jailed fraudster’s £2m palace abroad
THIS is the astonishing £2 million ‘Buckingham Palace’ home built in Pakistan by Birmingham fraudster Mohammed Suleman Khan.
The mansion is half-built and patrolled by armed guards in the Attock region, where the feared criminal is known as ‘Don’ to locals.
For years Khan, 46, tried to evade the attention of the police as he built up a fortune from behind the walls of his Moseley home.
Even to other criminals in Birmingham, he was a shadowy figure known as The General, MSK or Sully, and was rarely seen in public.
But while careful to avoid showing any trappings of wealth in the UK, police discovered he had secretly paid for the mansion to be built in Pakistan. It is believed there are 30 to 40 rooms in the mansion, which also boasts swish lawns and a swimming pool in the backyard.
It boasts a library, private cinema, and servant quarters. Khan was originally imprisoned for four years in April 2014 after defrauding the taxman of £450,000.
He was due for release in April 2016, but will now face ten more years behind bars after defaulting on a Proceeds of Crime order.
Now pictures have emerged of the home his fraud built. One local said Khan bought the two-acre piece of land to build his huge palace some eight years ago. But work stopped after the tax evasion case started against him in UK. The unfinished compound has become a “no-go area” for locals as around a dozen armed security men guard it.
“If you try to get in, or jump from the wall, they will shoot you,” a neighbour claimed, adding, “They often do aerial firing at night too.” The compound has minaret security pickets on its corner. Locals say Khan won approval from the local government to name the palace after his own name in Urdu – Suleman Abad. The village lies on the boundary of Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. One villager said: “Don used to come here off and on. Even children call him ‘Don’ and know that this huge palace is his house.” Khan had been a regular visitor over the years, another local said, and was usually accompanied by armed guards. “He always helped people village,” he said. The original tax scam was exposed after police raided Khan’s Moseley in the home and found plans for the Pakistan mansion.
In February 2016, it was revealed detectives planned to seize and sell his Birmingham family home after he was sentenced to a further ten years for refusing to pay back £2.2 million.
In court, Khan’s defence portrayed him as a legitimate businessman who had earned around £400,000 over a nine-year period from debt collecting and other business interests in the UK and abroad.
But police found no evidence of a legitimate debt-collecting company and their investigation proved he had netted over £1 million during that period, without paying the required tax and National Insurance.
The court heard the outer shell and roof of the Pakistan building had been completed by Khan at a cost of £893,000.
Once finished, the property would have been valued at £2.3 million.