Thursday, November 26, 2009

Richard K Halligen - LinkedIn


Richard K Halligen - LinkedIn


Chairman/Founder at Oakley International Group
Washington D.C. Metro Area

Current Chairman/Founder at Albion Consultants
Past Founder at Oakley International Group
Industry International Affairs
Richard K Halligen’s Summary

My group is internationally-focused and located Firm with over 30 years of experience on all major continents. We assist foreign governments and commercial clients that possess a variety of problems with innovative solutions, including venture capital, private equity, risk management and crisis solutions.

Richard K Halligen’s Experience

Chairman/Founder
Albion Consultants
(International Affairs industry)
January 2009 — Present (11 months)

Founder
Oakley International Group
(International Affairs industry)
2006 — December 2008 (2 years )

WebCite Archive of this page

Kevin Halligen, 'conman' accused of defrauding McCanns, arrested at hotel in Oxford

The Times
November 25, 2009
Kevin Halligen, 'conman' accused of defrauding McCanns, arrested at hotel in Oxford
Mary Bowers

A 48-year-old man wanted by the FBI who allegedly defrauded people across the world, including the Madeleine McCann fund, was arrested last night at a hotel in Oxford.

Kevin Halligen, from Surrey, was hired by the Find Madeleine fund as a security consultant. His Washington-based company, Oakley International, was awarded a six-month £500,000 contract by the fund, but Mr Halligen allegedly disappeared with £300,000.

He had allegedly boasted that his contacts in the US capital could provide high-tech satellite imagery to help the search.

He is also said to have made £1 million from links with Trafigura, the controversial Dutch company accused of causing mass illness after waste was dumped on the Ivory Coast.

According to The Sun, Mr Halligen booked into the Old Bank Hotel in Oxford with an old girlfriend under the alias Richard Stratton. A source told the newspaper that the couple were preparing to leave in a taxi when police arrived and arrested him.

Thames Valley Police last night confirmed that a 48-year-old man was arrested at the Old Bank Hotel on suspicion of fraud after a discrepancy in his hotel bill. He was being held last night in the city and it is reported that a court hearing related to his extradition will take place later today.

Two weeks ago, he was indicted in the US on charges of wire fraud and money laundering over a false contract with lawyers acting on behalf of Trafigura.

A report from the FBI said that he was wanted for conning the law firm of $2.1 million (£1.26 million) between November 2006 and January 2007. He had supposedly promised to use the funds to secure the release of two of the company’s executives, but allegedly fled and used the money to buy a mansion.

Having left a string of creditors in his wake, Dublin-born Mr Halligen’s debts are estimated to amount to £3 million. Though he is known as Halligen, the name on his birth certificate is said to be spelt with an “a”.

He allegedly fooled individuals at the highest echelons of the security business and tricked friends by claiming that he had worked for a string of intelligence organisations in Britain and the US. He is also said to have claimed that he briefed the Pentagon on Iraq.

A spokesman for the McCann family said: “Our association with Halligen and Oakley International ended well over a year ago. Given that an arrest has been made it would be inappropriate for us to comment.”

According to the FBI indictment, Mr Halligen told a law firm that he needed funds “to pay expenses incurred in the United States to help secure the release of two executives of a client of the law firm who were arrested in the country of Ivory Coast” but instead spent the cash on a mansion in Great Falls, Virginia.

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Diario de Noticias, 23 Nov 2009. Page 24

Monday, November 23, 2009

Department of Justice Press Release re: Halligen

Department of Justice Press Release
For Immediate Release
November 12, 2009 United States Attorney's Office
District of Columbia
Contact:

United Kingdom Man Indicted for Fraud

Washington, D.C.—Kevin R. Halligen, 48, of Surrey, United Kingdom, was indicted today on charges of wire fraud and money laundering by a grand jury sitting in the District of Columbia, announced Acting U.S. Attorney Channing D. Phillips and Joseph Persichini, Jr., Assistant Director in Charge of the Washington Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The indictment alleges that from November 2006 to January 2007, Halligen engaged in a scheme to defraud a London-based law firm of $2,100,000. The indictment alleges that Halligen falsely represented to the law firm that these funds would be used to pay expenses incurred in the United States to help secure the release of two executives of a client of the law firm who were arrested in the country of Ivory Coast.

Contrary to these representations, Halligen, the indictment alleges, used the funds for his own benefit including purchasing a mansion located in Great Falls, Virginia.

In announcing the indictment, Acting U.S. Attorney Phillips and FBI Assistant Director in Charge Persichini praised the work of the FBI Special Agent who investigated this case. They also commended Paralegal Specialist Mary Treanor, Legal Assistants Jamasee Lucas, Sabrina Brown, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Vasu Muthyala, who is prosecuting the case.

An indictment is merely a formal charge that a defendant has committed a violation of criminal laws and every defendant is presumed innocent until, and unless, proven guilty.

FBI hunts for investigator paid £500,000 by McCanns

23 November 2009
FBI hunts for investigator paid £500,000 by McCanns
Briton implicated in string of frauds thought to have changed his identity
The Independent
Jerome Taylor

A private investigator whose company was paid more than £500,000 by the McCann family to look for their missing daughter has gone on the run after being implicated in a string of high-profile frauds.

Kevin Halligen, 48, is thought to have pocketed at least £300,000 from public donations that were given in the wake of Madeline McCann's disappearance before he went on the run from his mansion near Washington DC over a separate investigation into an allegation that he defrauded an international oil company out of more than £1m.

The FBI has issued a warrant for his arrest and US officials believe he is living with a girlfriend in Britain under an assumed identity. Halligen is also being pursued by a number of fellow private investigators and former secret-service officers who say they have also been defrauded by him. Halligen, who regularly claimed he had worked for Britain's security services but in fact had a background in consultancy work, was indicted by the US Department of Justice last week over an allegation that he used £1.2m which had been given to him by the international oil company, Trafigura, to fraudulently buy a mansion.

The money was meant to have been used to help secure the release of two high-level employees of the Dutch company accused of dumping toxic waste in West Africa.

In September 2006 Claude Dauphin, the president of the company, and another executive were seized in the Ivory Coast following the dumping of toxic chemicals on the outskirts of Abidjan. Halligen's private detective agency, Oakley International, was hired by the company to help to identify the key power brokers in the Ivory Coast and secure the executives' release. But instead he allegedly used the money to buy himself a mansion in Great Falls, Virginia.

The following year Halligen's firm was hired by the Madeleine Fund to help in the search for the three-year-old, who went missing from her parent's holiday home in the Portuguese resort of Praia da Luz in May 2007. But he was dropped from the investigation after just six months.

Private detectives who were brought in by Halligen's firm to look for the missing girl have since come forward to claim that they were not paid for their services. They are now looking for Halligen themselves.

According to a Sunday newspaper, Halligen was hired by the Madeleine Fund through Henri Exton, a former national head of undercover operations for the police who was already working on the Madeleine's disappearance. Exton was reportedly assured by Halligen that his contacts in Washington would be able to provide the fund with high-tech satellite imagery from Portugal the night Madeleine was abducted. But according to one source quoted in The Sunday Times "all he came up with was a Google Earth image".

Halligen's contract with the Madeline Fund, which received more than £1m in public donations following her disappearance, came to an end in October 2008, but not before his firm had pocketed £500,000.

In October last year, Halligen left the United States saying he needed a holiday in Rome. He left his wife to fly first class to Italy with a new girlfriend where they reportedly settled into the five-star Cavalieri hotel. He was last seen staying at the five-star Royal Crescent Hotel in Bath under and assumed name and is thought to still be in Britain.

The McCanns' spokesman, Clarence Mitchell, said: "Oakley International was contracted to help with the search for Madeleine. Due diligence was carried out at every stage and payment was only made for work properly carried out. It was only towards the end of the six-month contract that question marks were raised about delivery in some areas and the contract was terminated."

WebCite archive of this article

Sunday, November 22, 2009

Noel O'Gara is an controversial Irish individual.

His website is : http://www.yorkshireripper.co.uk.

He believes he knows the identity of the Yorkshire Ripper, that the person who was convicted was actually a "copycat" killer and responsible for only a few of the many brutal murders.

O'Gara believes that the actual Yorkshire Ripper is an Irishman who was formerly employed by him and who is still at large. O'Gara has been campaigning for years about this, and believes that the reason his former employee was not convicted of the murders is that he was actually a supergrass employed by the British government.

It is his belief that Peter Sutcliffe who was convicted of ALL the murders, was set up by the British police to calm a terrified public and to stop public speculation from landing on the true murderer, who O'Gara is convinced was protected from prosecution due to his value as an informer.

O'Gara has a bit of a reputation online, as one can see by reading the Usenet postings about him. One could argue that anyone in his situation, who believes they have proof of a huge cover-up by the British government, a cover-up that would have to include many police officers and other government employees would quite easily be characterized a "kook" due to the difficulty of arguing their case, particularly when it involves something as earthshaking as allowing the false imprisonment of individuals chosen to take the "rap" for the crimes and the outright lies by government officials and the forensic scientists involved.

O'Gara's theories cross paths with my own in regard to an individual named Ronald Castree.

O'Gara provides some strong arguments regarding the Castree conviction in the Lesley Molseed case; arguing that Castree was convicted based on false DNA evidence.

I agree that this is extremely likely to be true, and that like Stephan Kiszko before him, Castree was set up to take the fall for an individual actually responsible for the Molseed murder, an individual who had been recruited as a supergrass and sent to Ireland to provide information to the British government regarding Irish terrorists.

Our paths take different directions from that point on.

O'Gara believes that Molseed was actually murdered by the same individual responsible for the Yorkshire Ripper murders.

I believe that Molseed was very likely murdered by Raymond Hewlett, the man who was the prime suspect in the case for decades, and who left for Ireland the day after the murders and managed to escape arrest throughout the many years he was sought in regard to the Molseed murder and another rape case.

Like O'Gara's theory of the Yorkshire Ripper case, I believe that it is very likely that Hewlett's freedom was won due to his position as an informer for the Brits, protected due to his value to them going undercover in Ireland to report on the IRA.

I'll attempt to lay out my argument at length and would welcome feedback and correction to anything I have misunderstood or omitted.

***

Facts:

Raymond Hewlett was the main suspect in the Molseed murders.

The murder occurred in Manchester, England on 5 October 1975.

( Note: Henri Exton headed the Greater Manchester Police undercover unit from (?) until 1993. He recruited supergrasses.)

Hewlett left for Ireland (Co. Donegal) the day after Lesley Molseed was killed.

An innocent man, Stefan Kiszko, spent decades in prison after being convicted for the murder.

Kiszko's mother never stopped trying to fight his wrongful conviction. Raymond Kiszko developed skitzophrenia in prison and died shortly after his eventual release. His mother died a few months after her son's death, to her grave believing that Raymond Hewlett was the true killer of Lesley Molseed.

The book "INNOCENTS" was written about the Molseed case by Jonathan Rose, Barrister, Steve Panter, MEN Reporter and Trevor Wilkinson, Detective Superintendent. Their conclusion was that Lesley Molseed's murderer was Raymond Hewlett.

During the Kiszko trial, evidence that could have proven his innocence was not presented at trial. Like CO'Gara and others, I believe this was done deliberately by the police and by the forensic experts involved in the case.

Like O'Gara I believe this was done in order to protect the true killer, who was protected due to his role as a supergrass. O'Gara and I do not agree about the identity of the supergrass, but the arguement as to WHY this was done is the same.

There was much public outcry after Stefan Kiszko's release from prison. His case was covered all over the world as one of the worst miscarriages of justice to have ever taken place in the United Kingdom.

The Molseed case was reopened, and Hewlett was again the prime suspect and allegedly the focus of a huge manhunt, including Scotland Yard, Interpol and the Irish Gardai.

News articles during that period provide one example after another of Hewlett disappearing either immediately before or immediately after a visit by police. He was known to have lived near Letterkenny, in County Donegal (allegedly in a "hippy" camp), in a number of cities in the South, and eventually for a number of years in Dundalk.

Recently Hewlett was back in the news in regard to the Madeleine McCann case. I will present my argument slowly, and will back it up with news articles to support my theory.

My theory is basically this:

Raymond Hewlett was offered a deal to claim responsibility for the "abduction" of Madeleine McCann in exchange for money paid to his family. Hewlett is dying of throat cancer. It should be noted that Henri Exton (see earlier posts) had investigators under cover in the gypsy communities "throughout Europe". I will present articles stating that Hewlett was associating with the gypsy community in Portugal. I believe he was contacted and offered a deal.

Further, Real IRA members are currently in court over charges related to their alleged use of proceeds from a restaurant in Alvor, Portugal, very near to Praia da Luz to support terrorism.

It would not be improbable that there were undercover operations going on in that region of the Algarve. It would not be improbable that Raymond Hewlett's presence there might have to do with some kind of surveillance.

Trafigura's Would-Be Saviour in Dock

Trafigura's Would-Be Saviour in Dock
1 October 2009
Intelligence Online


Hired to spring the chief executive of Trafigura from jail in Abidjan, the Oakley company now finds itself under attack by the trader’s lawyer.

Founder of the private security firm Red Defense International, Britain’s Kevin Halligen had until the first of September to respond to a suit filed by lawyer Mark Aspinall that called upon him to pay USD 1.3 million. He let the deadline pass and was thereby declared in default by the U.S. district court for the District of Colombia.

Intelligence Online reported in its 576th issue how Aspinall recruited
Halligen, who took part indirectly in a MI5 operation in Northern Ireland, to help organize the release of his client, Claude Dauphin, founder of Trafigura, from the Maca prison in Abidjan. Dauphin had been arrested in Ivory Coast following the unloading of toxic waste by the vessel Probo Koala that had been chartered by Trafigura.

The rescue operation mounted by Red Defense, which involved using a Falcon corporate jet and South African mercenaries, was finally cancelled in February, 2007. Dauphin was released a few months later against payment of USD 198 million. Following that episode, Aspinall and Halligen remained in contact and, in September, 2007, the lawyer invested USD 500,000 in two firms founded by Halligen in the United States, Oakley International Group (OIG) and Oakley Strategic Services (OSS). Six months later, he lent USD 250,000 to Halligen to replenish the coffers of the two firms, whose managing director was the former deputy assistant secretary of defense for counternarcoitics, Andre Hollis. The latter is also a lawyer in the firm Van Scoyoc Associates.

Despite his investments, Aspinall never had access to the books of OIG or OSS, nor was his loan repaid. Under pressure from the lawyer to make good on his promise, Halligen instead left for Italy last December, and has yet to return. His two companies declared bankruptcy and Aspinall, the only stakeholder who remained creditworthy, had to pay off their debts.

To recover money he lost in the venture, Aspinall filed suit (1-09-cv-00655) against Halligen. But even if he wins his case, he probably won't get his money back.