Ron Bakir
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ron Bakir (Arabic: رون باكر) ( also known as Rani Muhuddine Hassan ) is an Lebanese-Australian entrepreneur and discharged ex-bankrupt from Queensland, Australia. Bakir is the founder of Mad Ron's, a mobile phone retail chain. He rose to national prominenance as a supporter of Schapelle Corby in 2005.
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[edit] Early history
Originally named Rani Muhuddine Hassan, he was born in Lebanon in 1977. He emigrated to Australia and since then is usually known as Ron Bakir. [1]
[edit] Later history
Ron Bakir was declared bankrupt in June 2002. The bankruptcy was discharged in October 2003. Officially, he is only an employee of the Mad Ron group of companies and has no management role. [2]
He started several companies in Australia, with complex intertwining ownership arrangements. The most prominent of these were the Crazy Ron’s and Mad Ron’s group of companies. "Crazy Ron's" was forced to change its name to "Mad Ron's" after a legal challenge from a rival mobile phone retailer, Crazy John's. Crazy Ron’s Communications (CRC), went into liquidation as of May 3 2005. Its assets had been "sold" to a related party in September 2004, leaving little for the creditors. Brendan Fleiter, the managing director of a creditor company, said “Every time creditors start asking to be paid, there seems to be the ‘sale’ of a business, or some other transaction, to a related party.” and “I’d like him to pay us before he pays the Indonesian lawyers.” [3] . The liquidator Paul Brake, of Australian Corporate and Personal Insolvency said “it seems likely there may be no readily collectible assets of any significance”. [4]
[edit] Corby's "White Knight"
In 2005, Bakir rose to prominence again as Schapelle Corby's "white knight". The amount of financial support that he gave Corby, and his exact role in her defence of drug charges against her has never been revealed. Corby's mother said that she'd wished Bakir would butt out of Corby's life. Corby's QC also told Bakir to "zip his lips", saying that his "limited financial advice" didn't entitle him to comment on her behalf [5].
Ron Bakir retained the services of an Australian law firm (Hoolihans) to investigate where the drugs came from. Given the secrecy surrounding the Australian government's decision to fund the Indonesian lawyers defending Corby at the court, many people assumed that Bakir was also paying their fees. In practice, no one knows whether Bakir actually paid Hoolihans or the Indonesian lawyers, although he offered to publicise documentation.
Bakir claims to have no relationship to Corby other than being from the same city. He reportedly decided to help fund Corby's defence because he believed that a miscarriage of justice could occur if she were not properly represented. Bakir has pledged $A100,000 towards the $A1,000,000 reward fund, although it is not clear that this money will ever have to be paid (the full reward was never raised).
Before the prosecution announced their sentencing recommendation, Bakir accused the prosecution team (chief prosecutor Ida Bagus Wiswantanu) of seeking a bribe to reduce the requested sentence. The prosecution team and the Indonesian government vehemently denied that this occurred. Corby's legal team openly admitted their anger at Bakir making these statements before the sentencing recommendation, fearing that it mght have encouraged the prosecution to seek a more severe penalty. Corby sacked her main defence lawyer, Lily Lubis, and case coordinator Vasu in July 2005, after Australian lawyer Trowell informed the media that the defence team asked him to request $A500,000 from the Australian government, money meant to bribe the judges of the appeal court.
Bakir registered a company titled Schapelle Corby Pty Ltd [6], causing others to raise doubts as to his motives. He subsequently deregistered[7] the company. Corby's father also expressed his concerns about the true intentions of Bakir, and Corby's mother was quoted as saying: "We didn't ask him to come on board, we didn't know him from a bar of soap, and now it seems like he's trying to profit from Schapelle's misery" and "I do think he's got ulterior motives" [8].
Many creditors of Mr Bakir's previous businesses questioned his ability to fund Corby's defence.[9] Corby's mother maintained that Bakir asked her to pay him back eventually. [10] Bakir was bankrupted in 2002 and discharged from bankruptcy in 2003. Corby's legal team requested Bakir to keep quiet during her appeal.
Bakir cut ties with the Schapelle Corby case on 24 June 2005 after Corby wrote a letter sacking her lawyers as well as Ron Bakir and Robin Tampoe.[11]. By 22 July 2005 Bakir deregistered both Schapelle Corby Pty Ltd and www.schapellecorby.com.au [12].
