CapitalOne inquiry: director Richard Abdilla Castillo resigns ahead of Premier bond issue

Richard Abdilla Castillo, who ran company suspected by police in money laundering investigation, resigns Premier Capital and Hili Group directorships

Richard Abdilla Castillo and Beppe Fenech Adami were directors of CapitalOne at the time of a 2013 police investigation of their clients into alleged money laundering. Abdilla Castillo is now resigning from a directorship in the Hili Group
Richard Abdilla Castillo and Beppe Fenech Adami were directors of CapitalOne at the time of a 2013 police investigation of their clients into alleged money laundering. Abdilla Castillo is now resigning from a directorship in the Hili Group

The director and owner of Baltimore Fiduciary, auditor Richard Abdilla Castillo, has resigned his post as a director of Premier Capital and the Hili Group, ahead of a €20 million bond issue by Premier Capital.

Baltimore Fiduciary was identified in a police investigation as the nominee shareholder and name-lender for CapitalOne Investment Group, a company whose owners were suspected of drug trafficking in the Netherlands.

In a drug bust led by Dutch police in Amsterdam in November 2012, business papers were seized connecting poker player and suspect Robert Soogea, to CapitalOne. Subsequently, Maltese police requested banking information on CapitalOne which suggested that large amounts of cash were being transferred from Greek companies into CapitalOne and then deposited into a Valletta Fund Management account, before being transferred back to other Greek companies.

READ MORE: Money laundering investigation was not pursued when Beppe Fenech Adami’s name cropped up

Premier Capital said that Abdilla Castillo had resigned his directorship pending the government inquiry into the reasons why a police investigation was not taken forward.

MaltaToday, which broke the story, reported that the police investigation was not pursued when investigators highlighted the presence of Nationalist MP Beppe Fenech Adami – then the parliamentary assistant for home affairs – as a director of Baltimore Fiduciary.

While Fenech Adami resigned his post in Baltimore in January 2014, Abdilla Castillo in August 2016 sold off CapitalOne to Greek national Ioannis Moustos, who was involved in the company at the time of the police investigation.

Premier Capital is the licensee of McDonald’s in Estonia, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania and Malta, and employs over 2,800 people. The company has offered to the public €20 million bonds due 2017-2020 at the rate of 6.8%.