The man who introduced Dominic Chappell to the prospect of buying BHS has accused him of bleeding the department store chain dry and said he wishes he had never met him.
Paul Sutton said Chappell had done “incredible” damage and BHS could still have been saved after it was sold for £1 by the billionaire tycoon Sir Philip Green in March 2015.
BHS collapsed into administration in April, leading to the loss of 11,000 jobs and leaving a £571m pension deficit. The retailer failed 13 months after it was bought by Chappell, a serial bankrupt. His consortium, Retail Acquisitions, is estimated to have been paid at least £17m by BHS.
The unwinding of BHS took another twist on Monday when a high court hearing due to consider whether to wind up Retail Acquisitions was adjourned.
Duff & Phelps, the administrator to BHS, is seeking the winding up order because it wants access to the Retail Acquisitions accounts and the return of millions of pounds owed to BHS. The case was adjourned after lawyers acting for Chappell submitted evidence against the order.
Chappell was Sutton’s driver while the latter was working with Green on a deal to buy BHS.
However, this collapsed after a whistleblower delivered a dossier to Green – revealing that Sutton was convicted of fraud in France in 2002 and making a string of other allegations against him.
Sutton claims that the dossier is part of a blackmail plot, which police are investigating.
After Green halted talks with Sutton, Chappell stepped in and continued negotiations.
“I wish I had never met Dominic Chappell. The damage he has caused is incredible,” Sutton told the Guardian. “He changed the team [after taking over discussions to buy BHS] then took millions of pounds and bled it dry.
“If things had turned out different, I could easily have saved BHS. I told the select committee that. It did not need to turn out this way.”
The demise of the high street chain is being investigated by the Insolvency Service, the Pensions Regulator and the Financial Reporting Council. The Serious Fraud Office is examining whether there are grounds to launch a criminal investigation.
Sutton said Green made a “dreadful mistake” in selling BHS to Chappell.
“I understand the debate about Philip, but the criticism is unfair. He always said he would sort the pension and he left the company with hundreds of millions of pounds [to invest in running the business].”
Sutton said his involvement with BHS had led to “untold problems”, including threats to his children at school.
He wants to revive his business career and clear his name of the allegations made against him, he said, which include that Sutton and his partner were involved in a Ponzi scheme in the UK relating to unofficial share certificates in Snoozebox, a pop-up hotel operator. There has been no prosecution over these claims.
“I have never been involved in a Ponzi scheme, I don’t even understand how they work,” he said.
On the fraud conviction, Sutton said: “If I had known it was there, I would have defended it. There are details from my lawyers that show it [the trial] was conducted without me in France. In France, it is now spent.
“I have been accused of all sorts of things and they are untrue. The police have witness statements that show what has gone on.”
Chappell has said he will make a statement about the winding up order “in the next few days”. He has previously said he “earned” the money paid out from BHS, his “conscience is very clear” and his team “did the right thing, right the way through”.
