The international fraud case Coan et al. v. Dunne et al. arose when Irish real estate developer Sean Dunne filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in Connecticut reporting liabilities between $500 million (€390 million) and $1 billion (€780 million).
Dunne, once an affluent developer, had companies that generated over half a billion dollars in revenue each year and was responsible for developing hundreds of residential and commercial properties. However, after the real estate market crashed in the early 2000s, Dunne encountered significant challenges and accumulated tremendous debt. His creditors included the major lending institution Ulster Bank, to which he owed over €164 million in debt, and the Irish agency, NAMA, which stepped in the shoes of most of Dunne’s banking creditors and pursued Dunne for €185 million. Additionally, one of Dunne’s creditors was the former attorney general, Paul Gallagher SC who had represented Mr. Dunne’s interests in the legal proceedings in the High Court in Dublin. BKD Architects, and Bruce Shaw Partnership were some of the many property-related businesses listed as creditors.
By filing for bankruptcy in the United States, Dunne mirrored the path taken by David Drumm, the former chief executive of Anglo-Irish Bank, who filed for bankruptcy in the state of Massachusetts in 2010.
However, Dunne’s intentions of filing for bankruptcy in the United States was part of a fraudulent scheme to abandon his business interests in Ireland, move to the United States, and escape from his creditors. Amid these financial pressures, Dunne fraudulently transferred all his unencumbered available assets to his wife, Gayle Killilea, for no consideration, which totaled in the Millions of Euros.
Nevertheless, Trustee Richard M. Coan, represented by Thomas H. Curran, as lead trial counsel, presented to the District Court of Connecticut (Meyer, J.), extensive evidence, over more than five weeks of trial, that ultimately led the jury to find in favor of the Trustee and concluded that Dunne made actual and constructive fraudulent transfers to his wife to hinder and defraud his creditors, and awarded in excess of seventeen million euro €17,000,000.00 plus more than $278,000.00, in damages.
You can read the full article at: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/dunne-declares-himself-bankrupt-in-the-us-1.1344535