THE liquidators of Carrian Holding Ltd (CHL) lost a claim to two London properties after the High Court ruled that the beneficial owner was the father-in-law of former Carrian boss George Tan. Mr Justice Godfrey found that Tan's father-in-law, Kao Wei Tseng, a former deputy general manager of a bank in Singapore, had paid $10 million towards the purchase of the two properties, which were worth a total of $13 million at the time. In its action, CHL had claimed that the properties were acquired with CHL's money, dishonestly appropriated by Tan in order to buy the properties for himself and his wife. The two properties were a house at Chester Square and a flat at Lees Place, both in London. The properties were registered in the name of two nominee companies, Crestflame Estates Ltd and Lowriver Estates Ltd. In his judgment, Mr Justice Godfrey found that Mr Kao had asked Tan to arrange the acquisition of the properties for Mr Kao's use and benefit. The court accepted that Mr Kao was the owner of a substantial fortune invested in property and securities. He was considering retirement and wanted to invest his life savings of $10 million. In February 1982, he visited England and found he liked London. He decided to buy property there as an investment for the future. But he wanted to protect himself from paying Singapore estate duties and so did not want people to know. He told Tan, who agreed to find something suitable. Tan then asked Trevor Bedford (former managing director of Hongkong Land) to find him some property in London. The Chester Square house was purchased for GBP925,000 and the Lees Place flat for GBP320,000. The Hong Kong exchange rate at that time broughtit to more than $13 million. The law firm Deacons confirmed in July 1982 that they had reserved Crestflame and Lowriver as nominee companies of Deacons for the properties. During the civil hearing, it was suggested that there was a fraudulent design on the part of Tan to misappropriate moneys of CHL to buy the two properties for himself and his wife. Mr Justice Godfrey said he was not satisfied on the evidence that this ''serious allegation'' had been proved. ''No doubt, George was anxious to conceal that Carrian, or himself, or Helen [his wife] or any member of his family, had any beneficial interest in these properties. ''But I am not prepared to extrapolate from this a design on the part of George dishonestly to appropriate moneys of CHL in order to buy the properties for himself, or for himself and Helen,'' said Mr Justice Godfrey. The remaining $3 million was paid by Helen. Rent received from the two properties was used to pay Tan's legal fees. The judge said he saw no reason to deduce from this that Tan was claiming to be beneficial owner of the two properties.
