Forum Finance fraudster Bill Papas sentenced to seven years over missing football wages

Greek-Australian printer rental magnate and fraudster Bill Papas has been sentenced to seven years’ jail in Greece after failing to pay former players and staff at his football club, Xanthi.

Bill Papas spotted on a beach in Greece. Photo: The Greek Herald

Disgraced Greek-Australian printer rental magnate and fraudster Bill Papas has been sentenced, in absentia, to seven years’ jail in Greece after failing to pay former players and staff at his football club, Xanthi.

The Australian has confirmed a judge in the West Thracian city of Xanthi sentenced Papas to seven years jail on January 31, after former players and the club’s new vice-chairman dragged him through court.

The court has now issued an ­arrest warrant for Papas, who is also wanted in Australia over his masterminding of the country’s largest ever bank fraud, which ­pillaged more than $500m from lenders including Westpac, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation and Societe Generale.

Greek lawyer Alexandros Gialaoglou, who is also the Xanthi club’s vice-chairman, told The Australian Papas had been hit with court findings in the Single-Member Misdemeanor Court.

“The court’s decision is a vindication for the workers, who since the beginning of 2022 have been living an ordeal claiming their earned money,” he said.

Xanthi FC’s then owner, Bill Papas, at his team’s game in Pierikos in 2021.

“We hope, even now belatedly, that the former major shareholder will assume his obligations and satisfy their just demand.”

Papas was being pursued by 20 former staff and players at Xanthi, who had taken aim over the former club owner’s failure to pay them for wages and leave entitlements, as well as Christmas and Easter bonuses.

The same court also hit Papas with a nine-month sentence in November last year, after a similar case involving staff who took action against him for unpaid wages.

A lawyer for Papas, who fronted court on January 31, only appeared in one of the four cases against the disgraced printer rental player.

Papas, who can appeal against the finding, now faces jail in Greece if picked up by police.

Sources said Papas’s whereabouts are unknown, with some suggesting he may be in Athens, Thessaloniki or over the border in the North Macedonian capital Skopje.

Papas owns multiple luxury properties in Athens and Thessaloniki, with the Greek-Australian businessman recently spotted in the seaside suburb of Glyfada at one of its many beach clubs, popular among locals and tourists.

The coastal community, on the Attica peninsula, has proved a magnet for Australians, including John Macris, who was shot dead in Glyfada in 2019.

Papas, who bought Xanthi FC for almost $15m, lost control of the club in 2022 after Westpac’s liquidators started seizing his Greek assets as part of a global chase for the bank’s cash pilfered by the businessman through a fake equipment rental scheme.

Papas’s former North Sydney asset financing business the Forum Group of Companies was found by a court to have funded its expansion, including launching a series of waste digester bins, on the back of fake lease contracts.

Vince Tesoriero, left, with his lawyer outside court. Picture: Jane Dempster

The Federal Court found Papas, and his business partner Vincenzo Tesoriero, concocted a scheme to defraud several lenders, with the money funnelled by Papas into beach houses, sports cars, jet skis, caravans, 50 petrol stations, along with other property interests in Australia and Greece.

A warrant was also issued for his arrest by Federal Court judge Michael Lee after Papas failed to return to Australia to face the court.

This came after Papas pledged to return, after slipping out of Australia during intense Covid-19 border restrictions.

He was later joined by co-conspirator and girlfriend Louise Agostino.

Papas’s former football team Xanthi surged in the Greek Superleage 2 standings in the wake of his purchase, rising to second place in 2021, from 13th the year before, with several Australian players joining the team.

Papas attempted to sell the club in September 2022, before being blocked by a court.

Xanthi was later relegated after liquidators froze the club’s accounts and disconnected power to the stadium, with several players quitting the team.

The team was inactive in the 2022-23 season.

Greek-Australian businessman Bill Papas photographed in Thessaloniki, Greece.

The Federal Court found in October last year Papas and Tesoriero concocted an “audacious fraud”, which was only discovered after construction and mining equipment supplier WesTrac queried a $12m credit facility, against its own records, which showed a $1.6m printer lease.

Westpac soon discovered the bank was at the centre of a rental fraud storm, telling investors it faced a $290m hit.

SMBC and Societe Generale also discovered they had been duped by Papas’s Forum Group of Companies, falsely buying the same lease receivables.

Of the almost $400m left owing at its collapse, liquidators McGrathNicol have been able to repatriate only $50m.

A NSW Police spokeswoman confirmed a Forum Finance fraud probe is ongoing.