Christopher Charles Skase (18 September 1948 – 5 August 2001) was an Australian businessman who later became one of his country's most wanted fugitives, after his business empire crashed spectacularly and he fled to Majorca, Spain.
His father was Charles Skase, 1948 winner of the Melbourne Sun-Aria, and prominent on-air personality on radio station 3DB, including his role as star of the live-to-air program, The Happy Gang, in the 1950s.
By 1989, interest rates had risen, an attempt to buy the MGM film studios fell through, and Skase was forced to sell half of his resorts to Japanese investors.
According to a 1998 report by ABC program Four Corners,[1] Skase had begun obtaining and moving money into foreign bank accounts in July 1989.
He was charged with improperly using his position to obtain management fees, briefly arrested and spent a night in jail.
His discovery on the Spanish island of Majorca in 1991 by the Sydney Morning Herald sparked intense media interest.
In one incident, television personality Andrew Denton organized a public subscription to hire a bounty hunter to kidnap Skase.
[6] By 2001, both the Australian government and Donnelly were starting to grow weary of the large costs of continuing the chase for Skase with $3 million having been spent.
[5] Nevertheless, there was renewed speculation in January that Skase would soon be deported from Spain – in which case it would have been legally possible to bring him back to Australia, with which Dominica had an extradition treaty.