SFO raiders 'found office safe empty'

The Maxwell Trial: Day 71

JOHN WILLCOCK

Financial Correspondent

Police who raided Kevin Maxwell's London office found the safe empty, Detective Sergeant Robert Scott of the Serious Fraud Office told the jury yesterday. A table was strewn with files and documents in a "higgledy- piggledy mess," he said.

The search of Maxwell House - one of the Maxwell empire's headquarters buildings - first took place on 6 December 1991, a month after the death of Robert Maxwell. One of the items seized was the tycoon's briefcase. Documents and files were also taken from the nearby offices of Kevin's brother, Ian, and from the office of Larry Trachtenberg, who was then a finance director.

In Kevin's office a table had been piled high with loose files and papers. DS Scott said that he and Kevin spent a long time identifying what the documents and files. Some related to the pension fund company, Bishopsgate Investment Management. They were then placed in separate bags and sealed before being taken to the SFO.

"It was a long tedious day for him and for ourselves," said the officer.

"Kevin Maxwell was under constant pressure from telephone calls and visitors and my recollection is that he spent at least two hours looking through each file."

One of the jurors spotted that the seal numbers on the bags were sometimes not in sequence, and asked for an explanation. DS Scott replied that thousands of numbered seals were in a bag. He would put his hand in and take the first seal he came to. "A bit like the National Lottery," commented Mr Justice Phillips.

"Yes, but there were no prizes for this one," said the police officer.

Mr Michael Moore, formerly a Bankers Trust executive, was closely questioned by Kevin Maxwell's defence barrister, Mr Alun Jones QC, about meetings and conversations he had with both Kevin and Robert Maxwell.

After a series of "I cannot remember" answers to questions and the revelation that he had never kept any notes of the meetings, Mr Jones asked: "Do you resent giving evidence, Mr Moore ?"

"Not at all," the banker replied. He was shown a memo he had sent to colleagues in November 1991.

He agreed it read that it was a "difficult time" for Kevin but that "the will to survive is definitely there."

Asked what his view of the situation was then, he replied: "I thought he (Kevin) was trying very hard to save the group."

Mr Moore remembered that once his father was dead Kevin was prepared to sell a number of the group's assets - "more than Bob would have wanted."

Kevin, Ian and Larry Trachtenberg all deny conspiracy to defraud by misuse of pension fund investments. Kevin alone faces a second count of conspiracy to defraud.