In 1990, Polly Peck collapsed following an investigation by the Serious Fraud Office and charges were brought against Asil Nadir on 70 counts of false accounting and theft, which he denied.
[6] Nadir studied economics at Istanbul University, but returned to Cyprus before graduation to set up a clothing business.
He returned to London in the 1960s, but after the intervention by Turkey of northern Cyprus in 1974, accepted the appeal of the authorities to bolster the new region economically.
The Turkish occupation enabled him to take over a Greek-Cypriot owned clothing factory in Nicosia, where he greatly expanded exports to the Middle East.
[7] Nadir was prosecuted on various counts of theft and fraud, amounting to 66 charges, but failed to appear at the trial in 1993 having travelled to the unrecognised Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, which has no extradition treaty with the United Kingdom, where he resided until 2010.
However, he said that he was fearful of the consequences to his health and refused to go back until the British government agreed to give him bail and not remand him in prison until his trial.
[9] Peter Dimond, the pilot who flew Nadir out of the UK from Compton Abbas Airfield in a twin-engined private plane, was jailed for two years in August 1998 for committing an act intended to pervert the course of justice, but he was freed by the Court of Appeal in January 1999 when it quashed the conviction after it was discovered that Nadir was not on bail at the time of his escape as his bail had lapsed.
[13] On 30 July 2010 it was reported that a British judge had granted Nadir bail, which it was said would pave the way for him to return to the UK to face trial.
[14] On 26 August 2010, Nadir returned to the UK with his wife Nur in a private Boeing 737 aircraft, leased from Onur Air,[9][15] to face trial.
[16] On 22 August 2012, Asil Nadir was found guilty on ten counts of theft of nearly £29 million from Polly Peck.