| Nicholas van Hoogstraten | |
|---|---|
| Born | 25 February 1945 Shoreham-by-Sea, England |
| Occupation | Property tycoon, entrepreneur, businessman |
| Net worth | £500 million |
| Children | 6. |
| Website | |
| http://www.nicholasvanhoogstraten.com/ | |
Nicholas van Hoogstraten (born Nicholas Marcel Hoogstraten[1] on 25 February 1945) is a British businessman and real estate magnate. van Hoogstraten is known for his business empire as well as his controversial life story: In 1968, he was convicted, and sent to prison, for paying a gang to attack a business associate.[1] In 2002, he was sentenced to 10 years for the manslaughter of a business rival. The verdict was overturned on appeal and he was subsequently released, but in 2005 he was ordered to pay the victim's family £6 million in a civil case.
He has been estimated to be worth £500 million, though he has stated that his assets in the UK have all been placed in the names of his children. His assets in property and farming in Zimbabwe alone are estimated to be worth over £200 million.[2]
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He was born Nicholas Marcel Hoogstraten in Shoreham-by-Sea, West Sussex, the working-class son of a shipping agent. His mother was of German and English heritage, his father was of Dutch and French heritage. He was educated at a local Jesuit school, but is also known to have attended Blessed Robert Southwell Catholic School in Goring-by-Sea, now known as Chatsmore Catholic High School. He left school in 1962 (aged 17) and joined the merchant navy for a year. He began his property business in the Bahamas with an initial investment of £1,000 realised from the sale of his stamp collection.[1]
He subsequently returned to Great Britain later in the 1960s with purchases in London and Brighton & Hove. By 1968 (aged 23) he was Britain's youngest millionaire with a portfolio of over 300 properties, but the same year he began serving a four-year sentence in prison for paying a gang to throw a grenade[1] into the house of Rev Braunstein, a Jewish leader whose eldest son owed him £3,000 (adjusted for inflation the figure would be closer to £100,000 as "you could buy a house for that much").[3] Of the incident he has said: "It seems a bit distasteful to me now," he says, "but back then when I was young... these weren't anarchists, they were businessmen, respectable people."[1]
He was also jailed on eight counts of handling stolen goods, and in 1972 was given a further 15 months for bribing prison officers to smuggle him luxuries. “I ran Wormwood Scrubs when I was in there,” he has said.[3]
By 1980 (aged 35) he owned over 2,000 properties. He later sold the majority of his housing, investing in other fields outside Britain, chiefly mining and farming interests in Nigeria and later Zimbabwe.
He is frequently interviewed in the Courtlands Hotel which he has "close connections with", but which is legally owned by his children.[4]
He was fined £1,500 in 2001 for contempt of court after telling the opposing counsel: "You dirty bastard... in due course, you are going to have it."[5]
In July 2002, van Hoogstraten was sentenced to ten years' imprisonment for the manslaughter of Mohammed Raja, after being found not guilty of murder: a jury at the Old Bailey decided that "although he wanted Mr Raja harmed, he had not wanted him murdered".[6] This conviction was quashed in July 2004 by Judge Sir Stephen Mitchell who agreed that "there was no foundation for a manslaughter case."[7] On 19 December 2005 the family of Raja, in a civil action against van Hoogstraten, were awarded £6 million by Mr Justice Lightman, after the court found that the balance of probabilities was "that the recruitment of the two thugs was for the purpose of murdering Mr Raja and not merely frightening or hurting him".[8] Van Hoogstraten is not held to be guilty of Mr Raja's murder or manslaughter under British criminal law: this requires proof beyond reasonable doubt rather than on balance of probabilities. Van Hoogstraten is alleged to have told the BBC that Mr Raja's family "will never get a penny".[9] Van Hoogstraten explained to The Sunday Times that he had "no assets at all now in the UK," having placed those assets in the names of the five children he has fathered with a series of black African girlfriends.[10]
He has been in the process of constructing Hamilton Palace, near Uckfield in East Sussex since the 1980s.[11] Construction of the neoclassical building began in 1985 and cost around £40 million up to 2006. The enormous edifice is intended to house his collection of art (currently stored in Switzerland) and also includes his mausoleum. Under English law, perpetual trusts are only allowed in the upkeep of monuments and graves.[12] By using the Palace as a mausoleum, van Hoogstraten's trust would legally own the buildings and its fittings after his death. A large section of his wealth has been transferred into a Bermudian trust for the upkeep of historic monuments.[11]
He was involved in a long-running feud with the Ramblers' Association and a legal battle with the local authority over a right of way that crosses the land around the mansion. In 1990 the paths were blocked with razor wire and discarded refrigerators.[13]
Hamilton Palace is so named because of the property van Hoogstraten owns in the capital of Bermuda (Hamilton). With little on the project being constructed in recent years and substantial local opposition, the project is currently on hold after problems with contractors.[14]
He first bought an estate in Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia) when he was 19. At around the same time he became friends with Tiny Rowland, who was then in charge of the London and Rhodesian Mining Company.[11]
He has been a close associate of Robert Mugabe (whom he describes as "100 per cent decent and incorruptible"[15]), and in 2005 announced plans to take over NMB, a major Zimbabwe bank, though he sold his stake in the bank for over £1 million in late 2007. In 2009, it was reported he had been "a generous contributor to Mr Mugabe’s Zanu (PF) party and (had) bought into several large state-owned companies."[13]
In January 2006 he said in an interview with The Sunday Times that, as a result of loaning £10 million to Mugabe, "In six months’ time, when the interest is due, it would be cheaper for them to just kill me".[16]
On 26 January 2008, he was arrested in Harare for allegedly charging rentals in US dollars rather than Zimbabwean dollars — illegal under Zimbabwean law.[13][17] He was also charged with violating the Censorship Act by possessing pornography,[18] and was held in custody for five nights but released on bail.[13] On 3 July 2009, it was reported that a Zimbabwe court had dismissed the charges of illegal currency dealing and possession of pornography: the police were unable to produce the officer who had allegedly caught him on the currency charge and they had seized the allegedly pornographic photos without a warrant.[13]
Mr van Hoogstraten has told an Observer reporter that he pays for the education of three children in every school in Zimbabwe: "Actually, it doesn't cost a lot of money in real terms, but I've set up things like that that will continue."[11]