'Fat Man' gambler who refused to honour £2m debt is told to pay up

Battle: Damian Aspinall, pictured with his partner Donna Air, issued a writ against Fouad al-Zayat and won a freezing order on his assets
13 April 2012

A gambler who refused to honour a £2 million casino debt has been told to pay up by a judge.

Fouad al-Zayat, a Syrian-born billionaire known in gaming circles as the "Fat Man", withheld the cash in a row over a croupier.

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The dispute came in the middle of a 12-year run of losses at Aspinalls in Mayfair that cost him £23 million. While the debt remained unsettled, Mr al-Zayat used cash and debit cards to stake £41 million at the casino and lost £10 million.

But last year Damian Aspinall, the London club's owner, issued a writ for payment of the debt that dated back to March 2000. He also won a freezing order on Mr al-Zayat's assets which include a Boeing 747 and a £158,000 Rolls-Royce.

It is extremely rare for casinos to reveal the names of their clients, let alone details of their finances.

Mr Justice David Steel ruled against Mr al-Zayat, who owns an aviation company and has homes in Cyprus and London.

The judge said: "The scale of both his wealth and his gambling instincts are revealed by the fact that between October 1994 and April 2006 the defendant visited the claimant's club on over 600 occasions.

"In this time he purchased gaming tokens to the value of over £ 91 million and in the process lost over £23 million."

The dispute arose when Mr al-Zayat lost £2 million in a single night's blackjack.

He wrote out a cheque to cover his debt but later cancelled it. The court was told his complaint was that his request for a replacement croupier had been turned down.

Gamblers often blame croupiers when the cards go against them.

Mr Aspinall applied for the matter to be disposed of without trial on the grounds that Mr al-Zayat's case was so weak. The judge agreed and ordered Mr al-Zayat to pay the £2 million plus legal costs estimated at £50,000.

Friends of Mr al-Zayat claim he may have gambled as much as £150 million since 1995.

In March 2002, the Ritz Casino issued a writ against him for allegedly bouncing seven cheques together worth £2 million.

Court papers revealed he gambled £21 million at the hotel in four years and lost nearly £10 million in 156 visits.

That case was settled out of court and friends of Mr al-Zayat say the Ritz later sent a team to persuade him to return to its club. At the time, Mr al-Zayat said: "This is the only sin I have. I have lost a lot of money.

"I know it's wrong to lose money like this but if you have ever been to a casino you will understand what the atmosphere is like."

The 15st businessman, who is in his late fifties, refused to comment yesterday.

One casino director said of Mr al-Zayat: "He is a huge tipper and it's not unusual for him to give £1,000 to a waitress who brings him tea and biscuits."

A friend said: "He talks big and he's pretty opinionated. He's fun because he is a good story-teller. But he tends to embellish things."

Mr al-Zayat made his fortune through FAZ Aviation, a supplier of commercial aircraft.

He was named in a recent corruption scandal in the U.S. which saw former congressman Bob Ney jailed.

Mr al-Zayat - who was seeking permission from Washington to sell U.S. planes and spare parts to Iran - was alleged to have given Mr Ney thousands of pounds worth of gambling chips in 2003. He is one of an estimated 180 high-rolling international gamblers known as "whales".

The biggest, before his death in 2005, was Australian media mogul Kerry Packer who lost £7 million in three weeks at another exclusive London casino.

Laws dating back 300 years hold that gambling debts cannot be recovered through the courts.

Casinos are different, however, because gamblers must use chips which are purchased like any other product or service.

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