Still lying low: McCann Team investigator Kevin Halligen, aka Kevin Halligan, aka Richard Halligen, aka Mr Hall aka Kev

According to the article below (May this year), the McCanns, or the Directors of Madeleine's Fund, were preparing to sue Kevin Halligen.

See highlighting in red

But, 5 months later, nothing more has been heard of this.

Did he returm to England?

Or to his native Dublin (see article below that)?

Has he handed his files to Detective Chief Inspector Andy Redwood yet?

The details of his contract with the McCanns would surely be of interest?


Sleazy secrets and the American Dream of Dublin born spy Kevin Richard Halligen
Posted on Saturday, May 25, 2013 at 08:16 AM

[PIC:  Kevin Richard Halligen]

The dapper British spy living a life of luxury in the Washington, D.C. area had a secret.

That’s no surprise. Such a worldly fellow would surely have built up a few secrets while trotting the globe.

His name was Kevin Richard Halligen and, among other projects, he was offered £500,000 - plus expenses - to help the family of Madeleine McCann, the English girl who went missing in Portugal a few years back.

Halligen “stayed in a Willard Hotel suite for months at a time and drank the days away at pricey Georgetown restaurants,” a 2011 Washington Post article noted. “He traveled everywhere in a chauffeur-driven Lincoln Town Car.”

Ah, but there was still that secret. Kevin Richard Halligen, the fellow with (as the Post put it) “amazing ease and a perfect British accent” was actually born in Dublin in 1961.

For all of the lies Halligen told – including to his own wife as well as to the distraught McCann family – if anyone had simply looked at his passport they’d have seen he was a Dubliner.

It turns out Halligen had actually never really served as a spy and had very few contacts in the global intelligence community. But there was one thing he was very good at --spending other people’s money.

Last week, it all finally caught up with Halligen. In a Washington, D.C. courtroom, U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly asked Halligen if it was his intent, all along, to defraud his victims. Halligen said, “It was.”

Halligen pled guilty to conning one London-based business out of over $2 million, though the actual amount of money he swindled over the years is much higher. Halligen is expected to be sentenced on June 27.

Halligen turned out to be a striver who concealed key facts about his past – in fact, invented a new persona for himself – so that he could live a lavish lifestyle, even if that lifestyle was funded through devious means. In the end, it all came crashing down.

If that sounds familiar, you may have seen the same story unfold this past week in a movie theater. That pretty much sums up the life of Jay Gatsby, the doomed main character in the new 3D movie of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s American literary classic.

At least Gatsby did it for love. Halligen, on the other hand, seems to have had no such emotions.  How else do you explain taking £00,000 from the McCann family? Halligen was supposed to use his vast international contacts to help track down the little girl. He never got around to it.

If there is any good news here, at least the McCann family is considering additional charges against Halligen, who is not expected to spend any more time in a U.S. jail since he’s already served a number of years while awaiting trial. He will be sent back to England next month, where more troubles await him.

“It is understood that Kate and Gerry McCann are now considering suing Halligen for allegedly fleecing their fund. He could also be arrested if the couple make a formal complaint,” the Mirror newspaper reported this week.

Halligen may represent a sleazy version of the Gatsby-esque American Dream/Nightmare. But he also represents a sad reality about America and its open borders.

“That’s what we get for letting all these damn foreigners in,” many say, when yet another crime is committed in the U.S. by those born abroad, whether that crime is financial theft or murder and mayhem at a big city marathon.

As Ayaan Hirsi Ali asked soberly in The Wall Street Journal this week, “It is reasonable to ask yourself: How many more young men like Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev are already living a double life in America, ready to take up arms for the cause of political Islam?”

It is reasonable to ask this. So long as we realize that Irishmen with posh British accents also commit rather disgusting crimes.

And so long as we acknowledge the vast contributions that millions of anonymous, law-abiding immigrants and their children make each day, in their own humble pursuit of the American Dream.

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Washington Post

This birth certificate shows that Kevin Patrick Halligan (spelled with an “a”) was born in Dublin on July 14, 1961. His father’s name is different from the one listed on Halligen’s 1991 marriage certificate. This birth certificate was provided by a private investigator trying to find Halligen after he left Washington in November 2008 and before his arrest in England in November 2009. The investigator said the certificate was given to him by Irish private investigator he hired to trace Halligen’s roots. It is impossible to be 100 percent certain that this certificate belongs to Halligen. But record checks in Kent, England, where Halligen told his former wife and others that he was born, show no record of his birth. The Post sent Halligen a photocopy of this certificate via his London lawyer, asking whether it was his. He did not respond.


Student journalist leads police to Madeleine McCann FBI fraud suspect hiding in Oxford hotel

Liverpool Daily Post - By Luke Traynor
Nov 26 2009

THIS is the Oxford University graduate who helped to snare a high-profile on-the-run alleged fraudster.

Businessman Kevin Halligen was arrested at the city's Old Bank Hotel on Tuesday, following several months evading police.

The 48-year-old was hired by Liverpool-born Kate McCann and her husband, Gerry, to find their three-year-old daughter, Maddie, who disappeared from a flat in Praia da Luz, Portugal, in 2007. But, after £500,000 was pocketed by him from the Find Madeleine Fund, his contract was cancelled after he had delivered precious little to the investigation.

Yesterday, it emerged that journalism student Christopher Winsley was instrumental in finding Halligen, wanted by the FBI for an alleged £1.3m con in America.

Christopher had worked part-time at the plush Old Bank Hotel during the summer when studying at Brookes College when Halligen was almost a permanent guest, hardly ever leaving the £350-a-night-room hotel and drinking heavily in the bar.

The Dubliner used various aliases including Mr and Mrs Hall, Kev and Richard before Mr Winsley left in September to pursue a postgraduate media degree in Falmouth, Cornwall.

When he spotted several Sunday newspaper articles on Halligen last weekend, and his all-important photograph, he immediately made the connection and telephoned Thames Valley Police.

Yesterday, the student said: "I knew straight away the person I was reading in the papers, said to be wanted by police, was the man I'd seen day-in, day-out at the hotel.

"I telephoned police, and it didn't seem to be a priority for them, but they appear to have moved fast and caught up with him.

"It wasn't hard to make the link. I even sent an email to the US embassy and phoned 999 and Crimestoppers. I’m surprised he didn't do a runner with all the stuff in the newspapers."

Halligen is also said to have caused consternation in the hotel, visited this year by celebrities including Meg Ryan over unpaid bills.

Following a short hearing at court yesterday, Halligen was refused bail and was remanded in custody until December 2.

I presume the Directors would have a legal duty to pursue Mr Halligen for the money if the allegation was that he had defrauded the Fund in some way.

Okeydokey wrote:I presume the Directors would have a legal duty to pursue Mr Halligen for the money if the allegation was that he had defrauded the Fund in some way.

If the Directors think he has committed fraud that is a criminal offence and I believe they should report him to the police.

There is this point.

The money used to

...fund Halligen's drinking sprees...

...fund his hotel bills...

...fund his trips back and forth from London to Italy and New York...

...etc. etc.

came from pensioners who sent the whole of their weekly pension to fund the search for Madeleine...

...and from children who donated their weekly pocket money to help find Madeleine...

..and many other great-hearted and generous British people...

...should not the McCanns attempt to recover what they can from Halligen?

And what was the EXACT amount they paid him?

It's never been disclosed in their annual accounts - which Dr Kate McCann promised would be 'transparent'

What are they waiting for - they are in regular contact with SY.   Report this man to the police NOW.

Taxpayers' money is being used for the hunt for Maddie (I don't begrudge money being spent on trying to find Maddie or what happened to her), but if the money in the fund was used by Halligen for his drinking sprees, hotel bills etc.etc. then I really do feel that the Directors should contact the police about it.

Money that should have been spent on the search for Maddie.

But why did it take so long  for TM to realise he wasn't doing his job? 

One might expect them to check results at least once a month after paying out all that money? 

Having set up a'hotline'  didn't. They even ask what the response was?  Where the number was advertised? 

Distinct scent of seafood here.

sharonl wrote:I cannot see the McCanns suing Halligen

The funds, (if they were paid to him), were allegedly paid via a complex route involving one or more of Kennedys' companies.(probably N E Investments), why?
The funds were paid to him, not stolen by him. What he may have done is not provided a satisfactory service in return for those funds.

In order to sue him the McCanns would need to:
1.  Prove that the funds were actually paid to him
2.  Disclose the purpose for which  they employed him
3.  Explain why they feel that he had not provided a satisfactory service
4.  Explain why they never checked him out beforehand
5.  Explain why large sums were paid upfront and not staggered

In his defence he may just say:

1. Exactly how much he did receive and how he was paid
2. What purpose he was employed for
3. What services he Provided
4. How and by whom he was selected for the appointment  (was he already known to Kennedy)
5. What really happened to the cash

He hasn't much to loose.  I am sure the McCanns don't want to face him court

And he might be able to ask the Auditors and the lawyers and the Directors why they all thought they had done 'Due Diligence'..
The McCanns don't want to face anyone in court.

There was a tweet a while ago (link below) from [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]


Kevin Richard Halligen if you're out there and back in blighty please get in touch with me [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

I presume Meirion Jones is this gentleman here
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]
Meirion Jones is a British journalist working as Investigations Producer on the BBC2 Newsnight programme

#trafigura 
#mccann

Ah yes 

#carterruck

Sceptic wrote: [...]
I presume Meirion Jones is this gentleman here
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]
Meirion Jones is a British journalist working as Investigations Producer on the BBC2 Newsnight programme

***
Who tried to throw his aunt under the bus in the Jimmy Saville case IIUC ...

tigger wrote:But why did it take so long  for TM to realise he wasn't doing his job? 

One might expect them to check results at least once a month after paying out all that money? 

Having set up a'hotline'  didn't. They even ask what the response was?  Where the number was advertised? 

Distinct scent of seafood here.

What was he supposed to do?

Who hired him to do what exactly?

Seems to me only the guy who contracted with him to give him money could claim breach of contract, depending on the contents of the contract. 

If,say, he undertook to take money from A to B, and he did that, then that would have been ok, wouldn't it?

Portia wrote:[If,say, he undertook to take money from A to B, and he did that, then that would have been OK, wouldn't it?

It would depend on whether or not, in agreeing to take money from A to B, he was doing anything illegal.

If so, both parties to the contract might be party to a crime.

In the case of the contract between the McCann Team and Kevin/Richard/Halligan/Hall/Halligen, it must have been specified, either verbally or in writing, what his task was - in order to earn half a million quid plus expenses for less than 6 months' work.

I suspect it might have been a verbal contract...

They had proper lawyers, Wells, Braithwaite,
They had proper Auditors, Hays, Macintyre
They had a professional spokesman, Mitchell
The "Fund" has proper Directors
Brian Kennedy, a retired head teacher;
Edward Smethurst – A Commercial lawyer;
Jon Corner – Director of a media company;
Michael Linett - retired accountant
Kate McCann - General Practitioner ? ? ? ? ? ?
Gerry McCann - Consultant Cardiologist

So they MUST still have the documentary evidence of the details of the "Due Diligence" carried out on all the people they employed.
There must be details of the contracts they entered into, with all the people they employed.
The "fund" was being run in a a transparent manner, according to TM.

So what can possibly go wrong ?

PeterMac wrote:They had proper lawyers,  Wells, Braithwaite,
They had proper Auditors, Hays, Macintyre
They had a professional spokesman, Mitchell
The "Fund" has proper Directors
Brian Kennedy, a retired head teacher;
Edward Smethurst – A Commercial lawyer;
Jon Corner – Director of a media company;
Michael Linett - retired accountant
Kate McCann - General Practitioner ? ? ? ? ? ?
Gerry McCann - Consultant Cardiologist

So they MUST still have the documentary evidence of the details of the "Due Diligence" carried out on all the people they employed.
There must be details of the contracts they entered into, with all the people they employed.
The "fund" was being run in a a transparent manner, according to TM.

So what can possibly go wrong ?

***
I'm sure SY will be able to tell you by now ...
 

tigger wrote:But why did it take so long  for TM to realise he wasn't doing his job? 

One might expect them to check results at least once a month after paying out all that money? 

Having set up a'hotline'  didn't. They even ask what the response was?  Where the number was advertised? 

Distinct scent of seafood here.

It would be especially good to know what the claims in relation to this would be, based on the following:

"Johan Selle, the director of operations at iJet, the US firm that managed the Find Madeleine phone line, revealed that for a year nobody even asked his company if they could listen to any of the calls received.
...
He said: 'We delivered Oakley a report with a summary of the calls and said if they wanted to come back they could listen to the recording, but nobody did."
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And Clarence should be answering questions as to what they deemed satisfactory other than the setting up of a telephone line, the only work he mentioned specifically, if he was able to make the following statement:

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."



I don't know much about the dates in relation to Kevin Halligen, but it would be good to know if Johan Selle was involved for a year when Clarence mentions a six-month contract.

By Numbers wrote:I don't know much about the dates in relation to Kevin Halligen, but it would be good to know if Johan Selle was involved for a year when Clarence mentions a six-month contract.

A good question - and welcome to the forum, by the way.

As far as can be ascertained, the most likely months for Halligen to have begun working for the McCann Team were March and April 2008. This was only first mentioned by Clarence Mitchell in early August, however - when Oakley International were described as 'the big boys of international private detection (!).

There was a major bust-up amongst the Directors of Madeleine's Fund in August 2008, which was so severe that several reports of this reached the press at the time. It is almost certain that Halligen's contract was ended in late August 2008.  

Dr Kate McCann's version of Halligen's contract was that it was divided into three stages. The first two apparently went well (despite the fact that he unearthed nothing of value), but things began to go wrong, she said, in the third phase.

I think Mr Selle was quoted by the Mail on Sunday in October 2009.

Thus if Selle's company (iJet) was supplying services to the Directors of 'Find Madeleine', it was likley that iJet was hired by them before Oakley came on the scene.

IIRC Kate McCann doesn't mention iJet in her book.

And let us never forget Exton, who seems to have been expunged from history.