Harrow School has received hundreds of thousands of pounds from companies that the National Crime Agency believes were part of a money laundering network run by a banker later jailed for a huge fraud, court papers have revealed.
Documents filed at the High Court show that the Harrow Development Trust, which finances endowments and capital projects at the school, received “payments of £500,000” in 2014 from the Latvian account of a British Virgin Islands company that law enforcers believe was channelling the criminal profits of Jahangir Hajiyev.
He was the chairman of the International Bank of Azerbaijan at the time and his sons were attending Harrow.
The court papers also cite a 2012 “donation (charity) to a school in UK” of £300,000 via two other companies involved in the alleged money laundering operation run on behalf of Mr Hajiyev.
They describe how funds channelled through them were used to “cover ..the private school fees of Mr and Mrs Hajiyev’s sons”.
The disclosures are made in High Court civil recovery proceedings in which the NCA is seeking to seize a £15 million Knightsbridge home and a multi-million pound golf club in Berkshire from Mr Hajiyev’s wife Zamira.
The agency alleges that the properties were bought with the proceeds of the huge fraud that Mr Hajiyev carried on the International Bank of Azerbaijan before his arrest and conviction for large scale embezzlement.
Mrs Hajiyeva has denied any wrongdoing and insisted that, despite his conviction in Azerbaijan, her husband’s fortune, which she used to spend £16 million at Harrods, was legitimately earned.
But in a witness statement to the High Court by its financial investigator Nicola Bartlett, the NCA alleges that Mr Hajiyev instead used a complex network of overseas and British companies, as well as bank accounts in Latvia, Estonia and Cyprus to move illicit money into the UK and elsewhere for his “personal enrichment”.
It says that one of the entities used was a British Virgin Islands company called Grayton, which was used to buy a Gulfstream private jet for Mr Hajiyev using the proceeds of “unlawful conduct” and also used to give money to Harrow.
“For example, the Grayton ABLV [bank in Latvia] account number LV42AIZK0000010349990 was used to make payments of GBP 500,000 to Harrow Development Trust in 2014 where Mr Hajiyev’s two sons attended Harrow School, with the reference “J Hajiyev”,” the court document states.
The document refers to the same transaction in a separate passage in which it states that although an associate of Mr Hajiyev’s called Khagani Bashirov was named as the beneficial owner of Grayton, “this company and its funds were used for the benefit of Mr Hajiyev”.
“Although Mr Bashirov was named as beneficial owner of Grayton on the ABLV account opening material, the company’s ABLV account was used to make payments towards Mr Hajiyev’s personal assets, including: a) GBP 500,500 paid to Harrow Development Trust where Mr Hajiyev’s two sons attended Harrow School, with the reference “J Hajiyev”..,” the NCA witness statement states.
The court document also describes how money was channelled to Harrow via two other companies called Kingsway Trade and Kirwin Investments
It alleges that Kingsway was a “money laundering vehicle” which was also used to buy a £1.3 million Cartier diamond ring from Harrods being targeted by the NCA in separate forfeiture proceedings.
Kirwin Investments, a British Virgin Islands company described as Mr Hajiyev’s “money box company”, is listed in the court submission as another of the “key companies” used by Mr Hajiyev to move the proceeds of crime.
“Funds transferred from Kingsway Trade to Kirwin Investments were used to make payments in relation to the purchase of UK property on behalf of the Hajiyev family, as well as to cover personal expenditure, including the private school fees of Mr and Mrs Hajiyev’s sons, and the costs of Mr Hajiyev’s stepdaughter’s wedding,” the court document states.
The document adds that between September 2010 and July 2013 the “Kirwin Swiss account” received $3.6 million and 2.5 million euros from Kingsway Trade, including one transaction that “internal notes” from Bordier and Cie, the private bank used by Mr Hajiyev, describe as: “3 October 2012 (“Received 500’000USD savings of the client’s that he uses to a donation (charity) to a school in UK (300’000GBP)”)”.
The NCA witness statement to the High Court does not allege that Harrow knowingly received illicit money from Mr Hajiyev.
Nor does it contain any assessment of the anti-money laundering and “know your client” checks carried out by the school before accepting receipt of funds from Mr Hajiyev.
The new court disclosures will, however, reinforce long-standing concerns about the potential vulnerability of the independent school sector and other parts of the UK economy to money laundering.
The proceedings against Mrs Hajiyeva are continuing and are due to reach trial next year.
In 2018, she became the first person in Britain to be given an “unexplained wealth order” using legislation introduced the previous year that has been dubbed the “McMafia law” after the hit BBC TV series starring James Norton.
Mr Hajiyev, who has denied wrongdoing via his wife’s lawyers, remains in prison in Baku serving a 16.5 year sentence for defrauding his bank.
Harrow said it would be inappropriate to comment on ongoing legal proceedings when asked to respond to the disclosures in the High Court document.
The school is one of the world’s most famous and has part pupils including Sir Winston Churchill and other former prime ministers as well as modern era figures such as the actor Benedict Cumberbatch and the singer James Blunt.
