THE FORMER chief executive of Anglo Irish Bank, David Drumm, has said the Irish Government wants to subject him to trial by media.
In a filing to the bankruptcy court in Boston, Mr Drumm has said the bank is being motivated by the political wishes of Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan and wants to subject him to “the spectacle of a public trial”.
Mr Drumm has asked the court to reject or constrain the bank’s application that it be allowed question him extensively about his debts to the bank, the circumstances behind his getting residency in the US, and the litigation he is involved in with the bank in Ireland.
That litigation was complicated earlier this year when Mr Drumm, who is now resident in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, filed for bankruptcy in Boston.
In 2008 the bank initiated proceedings in Ireland seeking the return of loans totalling €8.4 million from him and seeking to nullify the transfer of his family home in Malahide, Co Dublin, into his wife’s sole name.
In his filing, Mr Drumm said that since the nationalisation of Anglo, the Minister for Finance has the power to require the bank to do or refrain from doing that which, in the opinion of the Minister, is “necessary or expedient in the public interest”.
Mr Drumm said since the 2009 Act transferring the bank’s shares to Mr Lenihan, “Anglo has ceased to manage its affairs as to the debtor in a commercially reasonable manner as a bank, and instead has systematically acted in accordance with the political concerns of Anglo’s current management and of Ireland’s top politicians.
“Several months ago the debtor offered Anglo all his assets, including pension assets, exempt from execution under both Irish and US law, to settle the Irish litigation and repay Anglo’s claims, but Anglo refused so it could proceed with the spectacle of a public trial.”
He said the bank is seeking an order from the Boston court that he be subjected to questioning about matters including the litigation in Ireland and that this should not be allowed.
If the bank is granted the order allowing him be questioned and forcing him to produce documents, it should be prohibited from asking him about matters irrelevant to the US bankruptcy or “calculated simply to cause maximum burden to the debtor.”
If the court grants the request from the bank, then it should order that Anglo cannot disclose the information it obtains. Without this Mr Drumm believes Anglo “will use whatever information it obtains to either hinder or delay this proceeding or to try its case before the Irish media.”
On these and other grounds Mr Drumm has asked the court refuse the bank’s request or else prohibit the bank from “disclosing information solely for the purpose of harassing the debtor”.
In his filing Mr Drumm said he was the chief executive of Anglo from January 2005 to December 2008. He had worked for the bank since 1993, including working for it in the United States from May 1998 and June 2003.
The latest estimate is that Anglo could cost the State between €29 billion and €34 billion.
