FORMER ANGLO Irish Bank chief Seán FitzPatrick yesterday appeared in the High Court for the first time since he was declared bankrupt earlier this month.
Mr FitzPatrick, who owes creditors a total of €150 million and has assets of around €50 million, was in court as bankruptcy proceedings continued against him.
The former bank chairman, who was legally obliged to appear in court, wore a navy suit, light blue shirt and dark blue tie.
He did not speak during the proceedings and declined to comment to The Irish Times as he left the Four Courts yesterday. He was driven away in a Land Rover vehicle.
Legal representatives for Anglo Irish Bank, which says it is owed up to €110 million, told the court it was seeking to have a “trustee in bankruptcy” appointed to the case.
This trustee would replace a court-appointed official, Chris Lehane, who was assigned a fortnight ago to deal with Mr FitzPatrick’s assets and debts.
Ms Justice Elizabeth Dunne adjourned the case for hearing until September 22nd.
Mr FitzPatrick’s assets are estimated to be worth close to €50 million, including investments of €46 million and €1.23 million in accounts in various financial institutions.
He is joint owner of six properties, including his family home and another house in Greystones, Co Wicklow; a house in Bray, Co Wicklow, and apartments in Marbella, Spain; Smithfield Market, Dublin and Killiney Court, Killiney.
Only the Marbella apartment is not subject to a mortgage.
Apart from Anglo, his creditors include investment firm Friends First, Bank of Scotland (Ireland), Ulster Bank and sister bank First Active, Haven Mortgages, AIB and the Revenue Commissioners.
Legal representatives for Haven Mortgages, a subsidiary of EBS building society, were among those present at yesterday’s case.
The former Anglo chief was declared bankrupt by the High Court a fortnight ago after Anglo Irish Bank blocked a settlement deal under which he would have avoided bankruptcy and repaid his creditors part of their debts from the orderly sale of assets over a period of time.
Anglo had asked the High Court to declare him bankrupt as the bank held more than 80 per cent of his overall debts and said any attempt to reach a settlement agreement was doomed to fail.
Mr FitzPatrick had claimed that his creditors would have got a dividend more than twice as large under his scheme than under bankruptcy.
However, he failed to convince a sufficient number of creditors to accept this.
This scheme would have included the sale of properties including a half share in his €1.5 million family home and making available to creditors half of his total pension assets of €3.4 million.
