Tycoon Scot Young ‘asked paparazzo to follow his ex-wife’

Scot Young, pictured with his girlfriend Noelle Reno, split from his wife, Michelle Young, in 2006 (Getty Images; PA)

A tycoon embroiled in Britain’s highest-profile divorce bribed a paparazzo to delete a photograph of him walking into an exclusive London restaurant three years after he claims to have lost all his money, the High Court heard yesterday.

Dennis Gill claimed Scot Young handed him £150 to destroy the evidence of him walking into Nobu in October 2009 – then offered a further £2,000 in cash if he would follow and video his estranged wife Michelle.

The photographer also told the court that the 51-year-old property and telecoms magnate, who claims to have lost a vast fortune just as his marriage collapsed in 2006, called Ms Young a “greedy cow” after she turned down a £27 million settlement.

“He said he would pay me £2,000 in cash tax-free if I would follow his wife on Friday taking a video and photos of whom she was with,” said Mr Gill in a sworn affidavit released to the press. “I said ‘OK sure’ and he said he would call me. Scot then said, ‘Between me and you mate, I offered her £27million and she refused it, only a greedy cow would refuse that.’

“He told me to keep it under my hat and not to tell anyone. He continued chatting and told me that he pays for everything in cash so that his wife cannot keep track of what he is spending.”

Mr Young denied making the remarks. During his oral evidence, Mr Gill said he was “1,000 per cent sure” he had recalled them correctly.

The bankrupt industrialist, who is friends with many well-known business leaders including Sir Philip Green, Richard Caring and Sir Tom Hunter and the late Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky, claims to have lost all his money in a disastrous Moscow property deal just as he split up with his wife.

Ms Young claims he squirrelled away “a few billion at least” in offshore tax havens with the help of associates.

Later, the court heard from Mr Young’s former lawyer Stanley Beller, who alleged the tycoon took £13 million in share certificates from his safe in March 2006 – the month his client also claims to have become “hopelessly insolvent”.

Mr Young has always denied owning shares in the telecoms giant o2. But Mr Beller read a letter to him in February 2006 signed by Mr Young instructing the lawyer to sell “my portfolio” of 3.1 million shares “in the capital of o2” worth more than £6 million.

Mr Young repeated his claim to the court that he had never owned shares in the communications company and said his former lawyer was a “liar”.

Mr Beller said Mr Young had owned a 40-strong watch collection worth £2 million and once mounted an attempt to “buy the car collection of the Sultan of Brunei”. The lawyer also told the court that Mr Young handed one of his creditors Harvey Lawrence £4 million in cash in a hotel room in 2008 – two years after the tycoon claims to have lost all his money.

Earlier in the day, the court heard from a man called George Constantine, who admitted receiving £80,000 into his bank account in 2011 from people he had never met and handing it to Mr Young.

Rex Howling QC, acting for Ms Young, told the court: “Our case is there has been a fraud on the wife by Mr Young.”

The case continues.