Francis Holland School named theatre after fraudster who made £250,000 donation

A leading independent girls’ school once attended by the actress Sienna Miller named its theatre after a fraudster following a £250,000 donation, a court has heard.

Francis Holland School, next to Regent’s Park in London, accepted the donation in 2005 from Achilleas Kallakis, 54, who duped banks out of hundreds of millions of pounds between 2003 and 2008.

The money was used to fund his extravagant lifestyle, which featured a fleet of chauffeur-driven Bentleys, a private plane, a private helicopter, a luxury yacht moored in Monaco harbour and a collection of high-value art works.

The school accepted the donation when it was attended by Kallakis’ daughter Erinoula and it was raising money for a new wing. The wing was named after the fraudster after he “negotiated the terms of the donation” with the headmistress and bursar, said Christopher Convey, representing the Serious Fraud Office.

Payments of £75,000 and £175,000 were made in 2005 from Kallakis’s Swiss bank account controlled by Swiss lawyer and businessman Michael Becker, said to have been a co-conspirator but never charged in the UK, the court heard.

However, the money came from “the proceeds of crime”, Mr Convey said. The court heard the school had an account in the Channel Islands, prompting the judge to ask: “Isn’t it rather unusual for a Church of England school to have an account in Jersey?”

Plaque removed

The school removed the plaque and returned £92,500 after Kallakis was jailed over a sophisticated five-year property and luxury yacht scam in 2013. The SFO is seeking to seize the money at a confiscation hearing at Southwark Crown Court.

Francis Holland School, which charges fees of more than £21,000 a year, boasts alumni including model Cara Delevingne, the late Nancy Mitford and the author Dame Rose Tremain.

Kallakis' wife Pamela wrote to the headmistress in March 2020 recalling the “small ceremony” to open the theatre but complaining: “It has come to my attention the school has removed the plaque... in breach of the contracted agreement” made in 2005.

In June 2020, Kallakis’ son Michalis launched a civil action in the High Court following the removal of the family name from the theatre and in July 2021 a settlement was reached for the school to pay £104,500 - including £12,000 in costs.

Now the SFO wants the remaining £92,500 it says is an asset available to Kallakis or a “tainted gift”.

The hearing continues.