Tagged suspect with no passport beat airport check
Judge slams security over fugitive tycoon
A TYCOON suspected of Britain’s biggest bank fraud fled to Pakistan without a passport while wearing an electronic tag, a judge heard.
Crooked Shaid Luqman was carrying a fortune in stolen cash when he flew from Manchester in 2011.
Judge Angela Nield said: “I am quite surprised he was able to leave with hundreds of millions of pounds and a curfew tag.”
Despite a warrant for his arrest, Luqman, nicknamed Lucky, remains on the run and is apparently living the high life, opening a shopping mall in Lahore and starting his own fashion boutique. He even posed on Facebook with a model jet. But Britain has no extradition treaty with Pakistan. Luqman, 48, left vast debts when his £300million property empire folded in 2006 and was branded “completely dishonest” by a judge.
He fled two weeks after receiving a 10-month suspended jail term and being tagged for trying to apply for a passport despite a court order banning it.
Judge Nield adjourned the review hearing into the arrest warrant at Manchester crown court.