FORMER ANGLO chief executive David Drumm, spent more than $72,000 on a Range Rover and stayed in some of New York’s finest hotels in 2010 – the year he declared bankruptcy in Massachusetts.
Details of the spending emerged during his first public appearance at a “341” bankruptcy hearing in Boston yesterday.
The hearing was told that Mr Drumm had begun transferring his earnings and jointly held property, totalling $1.6 million, to his wife Lorraine in September 2008.
An attorney for Anglo, Kenneth Leonetti, noted that “Mrs Drumm set up her own account for the first time on September 24th, 2008 with $150,000,” that Mr Drumm had transferred.
“Isn’t the real reason you transferred all this money because you wanted to keep it safe from creditors?” Mr Leonetti asked.
Mr Drumm said “no”. “It dawned on she didn’t know where the money was, so she took a lot of money over.”
He bought two expensive vehicles, both Range Rovers, after moving to the US in 2009. He paid $70,000 for the first, but sold it a year later at a loss of $20,000. Why did he buy two top-of-the-range cars in swift succession, John Hotchinson, one of four attorneys representing Anglo, asked.
“It wasn’t a good car,” Mr Drumm said of the first Range Rover.
Mr Drumm charged stays in two of the most luxurious hotels in New York, the Pierre and the Plaza, to his struggling consultancy group. Mr Hotchinson produced a receipt showing Mr Drumm spent $595 for a night in the Pierre Hotel. “Would you agree this is one of the finest hotels in New York?” the attorney asked. Mr Drumm declined to reply.
On another trip, he spent $995 at the Plaza Hotel. He said he went to Manhattan on business, but refused to detail the nature of that business.
Mr Drumm also gave $6,000 from his company to his brother last year. “Do you see yourself in a position to give loans to other people, bearing in mind you filed for bankruptcy?” Hotchinson asked.
“He needed the money,” said Mr Drumm, who was chief executive of Anglo from 2004 until he resigned in December 2008. He said he moved to the US in June 2009 because job prospects were better there. “I had a good history here. Having resigned from the bank in difficult circumstances, I thought it would be difficult to get a job in Ireland,” he said.
Report: page 16
