NATION/WORLD UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Friday, March 3, 1995
7A
British trader caught on plane
Broker couldn't outrun authorities on secret return
Ron Coddington/KNIGT-RIDDER TRIBI
The Associated Press
FRANKFURT, Germany — The British trader whose gambles led to the collapse of Britain's oldest investment bank was several steps ahead of a Singapore arrest warrant and almost home when police caught up with him yesterday.
Nick Leeson was escorted off a flight from Malaysia and detained by German police while authorities waited for an extradition request and arrest warrant accusing him of mishandling money and other charges.
Leeson repeatedly told police he wanted to return to Britain, where his employer, Baring Brothers & Co., was trying to figure out how one man could lose an estimated $1 billion and bring down the 232-year-old bank in a matter of weeks.
In its first comment on the case, Singapore's fraud squad said yesterday, it was investigating a complaint by Baring Futures that the 28-year-old Leeson committed forgery.
It said the Baring complaint was made to police Monday, four days
after Leeson and his wife, Lisa Simms, already had fled their luxury condominium in Singapore, leaving newspapers at the door and laundry drying on the balcony.
The couple drove across the border into Malaysia, where they spent the night, then went on to a ritzy resort in Kota Kinabalu, about 900 miles away on the island of Borneo.
Malaysia's Daily Express newspaper said Leeson went to Royal Brunei Airlines office in Kota Kina-
balu on Tuesday, asked for the next available flight to Europe and paid $1,500 cash for the tickets.
Zakri Abdul Rashid, director-general of Malaysia's immigration Department, said Leeson's flight left Wednesday night before immigration authorities could act on a police request to detain him.
He blamed the delay on timing, saying the department's computer system was not connected with all state immigration departments.
Daily Express assistant editor James Sardra said he tried to have the plane stopped in Bangkok, where it made a scheduled stop, but the airport duty manager told him on the phone. "Please don't ask me to go to the runway and try to stop the plane."
Police, carrying pictures of the couple, boarded the plane when it landed in Frankfurt early yesterday. Leeson was taken into custody, but Simms was released and flew to Britain.
The couple's newly hired lawyer, Eberhard Kempf, said Leeson probably would spend the night in a Frankfurt prison before he was taken before a judge today where he was expected to fight an extradition request.
Traders cheered and jeered when news of Leeson's detention flashed on a giant screen above the floor of Singapore's futures market.
Frankfurt's chief prosecutor, Heinz-Hermann Eckart, told a news conference that an international arrest warrant accused Leeson of falsifying a passport and mishandling money.
Eckart said the extradition process could take three months.
Leeson is said to have made failed bets on which way the Tokyo stock market would go. He cost the bank an estimated $1 billion.
Top GOP fund-raiser joins Dole team
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON—Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole continued to lay the groundwork for his 1996 presidential campaign by recruiting a top GOP fund-raiser as his finance chairman.
Dole announced Wednesday that John Moran would move from the Republican National Committee, where Moran has helped the party raise $115 million during the past two years.
"He's one of the best fund-raisers in the country," Dole said.
Dole named Henry Kravis, who heads the New York merchant banking firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and Co., Denver businessman Philip F. Anschutz and Paine Webber chief Donald B. Marron s deputy finance chairmen.
"Combined, this group has raised money for the last four GOP presidents." Dole said.
Moran, who heads the New York-based Dyson-Kissner-Moran manufacturing and distribution company, said he left the RNC for Dole because of the opportunity to have a Republican in the White House
and Republican control of Congress.
"It is important that we nominate a strong candidate who will win in 1996 and carry the rest of the ticket to victory," Moran added. "Bob Dole is that man."
Dole has enlisted 22 other business people from around the country to serve as national vice chairmen of his finance committee, including Don and Adele Hall of Hallmark Cards in Kansas City, Mo., Florida sugar baron Jose "Pepe" Farul and financier T. Boone Pickens of Texas.
Dole also said the campaign has qualified for federal matching funds. The exact amount he has raised for the 1996 race won't be made public until the end of March, said campaign representative Kathryn Coombs.
Dole plans to officially announce his third bid for the White House on April 10 in Topeka. His previous runs were in 1980 and 1988.
Texas Sen. Phil Gramm and former Tennessee Gov. Lamar Alexander already are officially in the GOP race, and others are exploring campaigns.
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