Russian oligarch wins partial victory over French superyacht raid
A sanctioned Russian billionaire has won a partial victory in his ongoing lawsuit against French customs authorities, with judges declaring the raid on one of his two yachts as ‘unlawful’.
Lawyers for Alexey Kuzmichev, who has an estimated net worth of £4.15bn, are arguing that French customs officials did not have the legal right to detain the vessels, despite the fact that Kuzmichev is on the EU sanctions list. The EU insists that Kuzmichev has ‘well-established’ ties to Putin.
On 16 March this year, France froze the 24-metre La Petite Ourse, worth $4.5m, in Antibes. The banker’s 16-metre yacht La Petite Ourse II, worth US$1.2m, was frozen the following week in Cannes. Both yachts were impounded on 6 June 2022.
On Wednesday (5 October), the Paris court of appeals criticised “serious errors” made by customs officials during the surprise inspection of La Petite Ourse, and deemed the mid-March raid “irregular,” according to Bloomberg News.
Judge Elisabeth Ienne-Berthelot reportedly pointed out that the customs’ raid report failed to mention that the captain “was informed of his right to oppose the search or any reference to any sanctions-evasion fraud” — and that this should have been the underlying reason for boarding the vessel. Ienne-Berthelot added customs officials failed to indicate in the report the relevant jurisdiction to contest the raid.
Kuzmichev’s lawyers are arguing that the banker should have access to his yacht, because he still has the right to use other frozen assets, such as cars and mansions – he just cannot sell or rent them out.
Shortly before he was sanctioned, Kuzmichev sold his stake in Alfa-Bank and resigned from the board of a large holding company with Western interests, LetterOne. He also listed for sale a four-storey mansion in New York City valued at $41m.
Russian-owned Axioma was recently sold at auction in Gibraltar. Image courtesy of Yacht Charter Fleet
Bloomberg reports that Kuzmichev’s lawyer Philippe Blanchetier said Wednesday’s ruling “enshrines the primacy of the law” and described the search operation as an “improvisation dictated by obscure political considerations.”
However, a customs official reportedly told a September hearing that — under French law — customs officials do not require any prior suspicions of sanctions evasion to obtain the right to search for evidence of attempts to avoid them.
The EU asset freeze in place on Kuzmichev means he will still struggle to move La Petite Ourse out of France.
Meanwhile, judges ruled Wednesday that a second lawsuit regarding La Petite Ourse II has been filed in the incorrect court. No decision has been reached and will be assessed in a court of appeals.
Numerous superyachts linked to Russian oligarchs have now been immobilised or detained across Europe, under sanctions levied in response to the invasion of Ukraine in February.
In August, a £63m superyacht, once owned by sanctioned steel billionaire Dmitry Pumpyansky, was sold at auction in Gibraltar. It was the first public auction of a seized Russian asset since Putin invaded Ukraine in February.
