Leeds United have been served with a winding-up petition for £150,000 in costs which relate to the club’s failed legal actions against the former director Melvyn Levi when Ken Bates was the club’s chairman and Shaun Harvey – now the Football League’s chief executive – was performing that role at Leeds.
Levi successfully sued Bates personally for libel over defamatory articles Bates wrote about him in the Leeds match programme and in June 2012 Leeds and Bates were found to have committed harassment of Levi, in broadcasts Harvey instructed the club’s in-house radio station to make.
Levi told the Guardian that his lawyers had been paid for those actions but this outstanding amount relates to a separate case brought by Leeds under Bates and Harvey which has been struck out. Levi said his lawyers, Ford & Warren of Leeds, warned the club it must receive the £150,000, a part-payment of their costs, by noon on Friday. Leeds, owned by the Italian businessman Massimo Cellino, did not pay, Levi said, and Ford & Warren issued the winding-up petition.
Levi said: “I am very disappointed that after 10 years of legal actions in which I have been completely vindicated and awarded costs, this one has not been settled. This is not personal against Leeds; Massimo Cellino bought the club warts and all and he has to honour the debts. I still support Leeds 100% and hope one day this can all be put into the past.”
Leeds said in a statement on their website: “We have been advised by legal counsel that the publication of the winding-up order to the media within seven days of its service is illegal and amounts to an abuse of process and a contempt of court.
“This activity was designed for the sole purpose of putting undue pressure on the football club. Our lawyers are demanding that the petition be immediately withdrawn, and a full apology made else we will ask the court to dismiss the petition on Monday morning.”
Levi, a lifelong Leeds supporter, who was a director from 2004 until Bates took over as chairman the following year, said that he had not been to Elland Road since Bates and Harvey withdrew his tickets in 2005 and banned him from the ground. Bates sold the club to the Bahrain-based bank Gulf Finance House in 2012 and it was sold to Cellino this year.
In March Cellino was convicted of a criminal offence of tax evasion in his native Italy but he was allowed on appeal to take over the club a month later. He has not yet sent the Football League the written judgment in the case, which the Guardian has seen, finding Cellino had “elusive intent” when evading the tax. League rules state that a person cannot be the 30% owner or director of a club if convicted of a criminal offence involving dishonesty. Leeds are 17th in the Championship under Neil Redfearn, the fourth manager Cellino has appointed since he took over in April.
