Neil Moffitt, the CEO of the mega club and restaurant company is fighting the US claim that a US$15mil chunk of Beverly Hills real estate he owns was also bought by Former Hakkasan Chairman Khadem al Qubaisi with misappropriated Malaysian funds — as part of the largest money laundering investigation in history.
“Moffitt had no involvement in the property at issue in the federal case other than as owner,” according to Ronald Richards, his personal attorney. “I expect the forfeiture complaint to be dismissed as the government was unaware of his purchase at the time they filed the forfeiture complaint.
Federal investigators have been looking a Hakkasan for quite a while, after Hakkasan Group’s former chairman, Khadem Al Qubaisi, was arrested earlier this month in Abu Dhabi, where authorities have frozen his assets. The Hakkasan club launched in Vegas in 2013, around the time that Al Qubaisi stole billions from 1Malaysia Development Berhad, according to the feds’ forfeiture civil suit.
Despite these issues, it looks like Moffitt is personally in the clear — and will continue not only as the CEO of Hakkasan, but probably expand to more and more things in the future.
