Prince Harry’s friend faces charges over major drug-bust on Malta-based jet

Prince Harry’s friend is facing charges over the 2012 seizure of an estimated tonne of cocaine on board a Malta-registered luxury private jet.

Fidelio Cavalli has been accused of helping arrange a massive shipment of cocaine to be flown by private jet from Venezuela to Benin. According to court papers in a civil action against Cavalli in California, he originally approached private aviation company MacAir on behalf of a friend.

However, the Australia-based airline did not have a large enough jet and instead helped Cavalli charter one from Hyperion Aviation, a Malta-based airline company with offices at SkyParks in Luqa. 

MaltaToday reported in 2012 that this larger plane was diverted to Gran Canaria, one of the Spanish Canary Islands, where it was met by Spanish customs police.

A search on board the aircraft yielded boxes with International Red Cross signs on them containing packs of solid cocaine.

Hyperion Aviation chief executive Eric Wiesskopf had told this paper that his company had assisted the Maltese and Spanish authorities all throughout the investigations.

“What I can say is that we were immediately in contact with them after a forced and unauthorised take-off from Valencia, Venezuela was made,” he said.

The UK Times on Saturday quoted sources close to the investigation as suggesting that the smuggling operation may have been arranged to provide funding for the Islamist militant group Hezbollah.

In court, Cavalli denied any involvement in the drug-smuggling operation, and any links with Hezbollah. He has lodged a counter-complaint against his accuser, a former colleague called Najib Khoury. Khoury insists that he hadn’t accused Cavalli of forming part of a drug-smuggling operation, but that he had sued him for emotional stress after receiving two death threats through voicemail. 

Lebanon-born Cavalli spent three days in Dubai with Prince Harry in November 2014, and has also been photographed alongside celebrities such as tennis player Novak Djokovic, actor Cuba Gooding Jr and socialite Paris Hilton.

He is the founder and chief executive of Dubai-based Royal Advisors Group, specializing in luxury travel. The group’s website describes him as a “connoisseur of fine living” who has “spent the majority of his life surrounded by an elite circle who travels to the world’s most sought after destinations”.

Cavalli was an unemployed waiter when his friend Mohammed al-Habtoor hired him as a driver five years ago. Habtoor is the son of billionaire Khalaf Habtoor, chairman of the Al Habtoor Group that sponsors an annual polo tournament at Windsor.