Westpac ups pressure on Forum Finance’s Bill Papas, seeks contempt of court order

Westpac wants the Federal Court to find Forum Finance founder Bill Papas in contempt of court, which puts him at risk of a fine or imprisonment.

Bill Papas – who is facing a contempt of court motion – last month attending a soccer match at Xanthi Arena in Greece.

Westpac wants the Federal Court to find Forum Finance founder and soccer identity Bill Papas in contempt of court, due to damning allegations he breached an order not to access his frozen bank and financial accounts.

In a case management hearing on Friday, Westpac’s barrister Jeremy Giles SC said the bank was bringing a motion that Mr Papas “be convicted of a contempt” in relation to dealing with money in an online share-trading account, breaching the freezing order.

“The contempt charge relates to a transfer which we allege, because the information we have at the moment only Mr Papas could do it, that Mr Papas caused Palante (his entity) to do from the online broker’s account a week or so after freezing orders had been served on him,” Mr Giles added.

A copy of the contempt application was delivered to Mr Papas’s solicitor Rocco Panetta before his relationship with his client was severed late last month. Mr Panetta replied to Westpac’s legal team that Mr Papas’s last known address was in Rozelle Sydney.

Mr Papas is facing separate legal action by Westpac, Societe Generale and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation over allegations of a $400m fraud relating to his equipment leasing firm, and involving claims of false invoices and forged customer signatures.

The alleged fraud is among the largest in the nation’s recent history, and entangles Mr Papas’s global property empire, expensive cars and a yacht.

If Mr Papas is found to be in contempt of court he may be fined or imprisoned, although matters are complicated by the fact he remains in Greece, won’t provide the court his current address and doesn’t have a firm plan to return.

Mr Papas has been holed up in Greece since June after Perth-based WesTrac started asking questions about its Forum account, and just several weeks before Westpac lodged the fraud action.

Mr Giles told the court on Friday the contempt motion was also being delayed by Mr Papas having disabled his personal email address, making him uncontactable to the bank’s legal team and Forum liquidators McGrathNicol.

The barrister said there was money in a bank account linked to the MacroVue online share trading account as well as a portfolio of stocks.

“The online broker at the moment is not permitting any dealing on it … that’s something we will want to move on at some point,” Mr Giles added.

Judge Michael Lee said an address for Mr Papas was required for the contempt motion and raised the possibility of jurisdictional issues with Greece, but noted it could still be executed.

“It would be able to be executed if and when he returns to Australia,” he added. Justice Lee also wants Mr Panetta to front the court to explain what he knows about Mr Papas’s whereabouts, but the solicitor did not respond to requests to attend on Friday afternoon.

“All I want to know is what he knows about this man’s whereabouts? I’d like to understand that without the necessity to go through this, to use the technical term, palaver.”

The case will now reconvene on Wednesday to address orders being sought against Mr Panetta.

Mr Papas initially told the court he would return to Australia to face the legal action, before he presented a positive Covid-19 test to say he was too unwell to return. More recently, Mr Papas said he was unable to pay for a return flight to Australia, given his bank accounts were frozen.

The court is providing Mr Papas a weekly living allowance and a pool of funds to fund his legal defence.

In July, Justice Lee issued Mr Papas an ultimatum and threatened action for his failure to file an affidavit and “persistent flouting” of court orders. An affidavit of his assets was filed, but Westpac questioned whether he had included everything within its contents.

Up until Westpac’s legal action became public, Mr Papas was Sydney Olympic Football Club’s president.

Fellow Forum director Vincenzo Tesoriero is a respondent in the fraud action and has also changed his legal representation. He is in dispute with his former legal team over a $233,000 bill that hasn’t been paid.

Mr Tesoriero’s new representative Sazz Nasimi of Madgwicks Lawyers was questioning how his client could pay his bills if his accounts were frozen.

Earlier this week, the Forum liquidator held formal court examinations to ascertain how the alleged fraud was conducted and track down the money flows.

Former Forum operations executive Craig Rollinson fielded a host of questions about emails from a colleague which warned as far back as 2018 of fake serial numbers being used at the company for equipment.

Relating to their respective fraud cases, Societe Generale and Sumitomo will present their evidence to the court by October 15.