Tannenbaum suspect assets frozen

Johannesburg - The assets of one of the key agents for Barry Tannenbaum's Ponzi-type scheme have been frozen by the Johannesburg High Court, Business Report said on Friday.

The assets included two Lamborghinis and three properties belonging to Darryl Leigh, the newspaper said.

Leigh may not sell any of his assets or use them as security for any loans.

Business Report said Leigh and attorney Dean Rees were allegedly responsible for raising the majority of the funds from investors for Tannenbaum's scheme.

The application was brought by Johannesburg businessman Christopher Leppan, who also brought the application last month that provisionally sequestrated Tannenbaum's estate in South Africa.

Leppan told Business Report he was owed R2.88m.

He said in an affidavit that the purpose of the application was to prevent Leigh from disposing of his assets, including those assets he held in trust, pending the outcome of a civil claim that still had to be instituted.

He believed Leigh had very recently disposed of a new Mercedes-Benz SLK 350 and an older BMW X5, the newspaper said.

"Leppan said the applicants had no wish to succeed in their civil action only to find they had a hollow judgment," Business Report said.

"I point out that Tannenbaum, born and bred in this country, has already left for Australia," Leppan was quoted as saying.

Leppan said that Leigh, along with Tannenbaum, had been operating a Ponzi scheme -- a fraudulent ploy that pays generous returns to investors from their own money or money paid by subsequent investors rather than from actual profit earned.

Leppan said Leigh had claimed he was a former banking attorney and legal adviser to Standard Bank but it had been discovered that he had been a senior legal adviser to the Development Bank of Southern Africa.

- Sapa