Tennis Star Boris Becker Bags Seven Years Jail Term For Faking Bankruptcy

Six-time Grand Slam champion, Boris Becker is facing seven years in jail after being found guilty of four insolvency charges relating to his 2017 bankruptcy.

Becker, 54, was accused of hiding millions of pounds worth of assets, including two Wimbledon trophies, to avoid paying his debts.

The former world number one Becker was declared bankrupt on June 21, 2017, over an unpaid loan of more than £3million on his estate in Mallorca, Spain.

The German national, who has lived in the UK since 2012, claimed he had cooperated with trustees tasked with securing his assets, even offering up his wedding ring, and had acted on expert advice.

But Becker, who was supported throughout the trial by his partner Lilian de Carvalho Monteiro, was today found guilty of four charges under the Insolvency Act by a jury at London’s Southwark Crown Court.

This included the removal of the property, two counts of failing to disclose estate, and concealing debt.

The three-time Wimbledon winner has bailed ahead of sentencing at the same court on April 29.

He faces a jail sentence carrying a maximum of seven years for each count.

He told a jury how his $50m (£38m) career earnings were swallowed up by an expensive divorce from his first wife Barbara Becker, child maintenance payments, and “expensive lifestyle commitments”.

The court was told how the BBC commentator received 1.13m euro (£950,000) from the sale of a Mercedes car dealership he owned in Germany, which was paid into a business account used as his “piggy bank” for personal expenses.

He was found guilty of transferring hundreds of thousands of pounds to other accounts, including those of his ex-wife Barbara and estranged wife Sharley “Lilly” Becker, the mother of his fourth child.

Becker also spent 48,000 euros (£40,000) on an ankle operation at a private clinic, paid 12,500 euros (£10,000) to a private jet company, and splashed out 6,000 euros (£5,000) at a luxury golf resort in China.

He was also convicted of failing to declare a property in Germany and hiding an 825,000 euro (£700,000) bank loan and shares in a tech firm.

He was acquitted of a further 20 charges, including nine counts of failing to hand over trophies and medals from his tennis career.

He told jurors he did not know the whereabouts of the memorabilia, including two of his three Wimbledon men’s singles trophies.

This included the 1985 title that catapulted him to stardom, as well as his 1992 Olympic gold medal, Australian Open trophies from 1991 and 1996, the President’s Cup from 1985 and 1989, his 1989 Davis Cup trophy, and a Davis Cup gold coin which he won in 1988.

Becker was cleared of failing to declare a second German property, as well as his interest in the £2.5m Chelsea flat occupied by his daughter Anna Ermakova, who was conceived during Becker’s infamous encounter with waitress Angela Ermakova at London restaurant Nobu in 1999.

Giving evidence, Becker said he earned a “vast amount” during his career, paying cash for a family home in Munich, a property in Miami, Florida, and the estate in Mallorca, which was worth about 50m euros at the height of the property market.

But Becker, who went on to coach current world number one tennis player Novak Djokovic, said his work as a commentator and brand ambassador for firms including Puma dried up and his income “reduced dramatically” following his retirement in 1999.

He said he was involved in an “expensive divorce” from Barbara in 2001 which involved high maintenance payments to their two sons.

And he also had to support Ms. Ermakova and her mother in a deal that included the Chelsea flat, he said.

Becker, who was resident in Monte Carlo and Switzerland before moving to the UK, said he had “expensive lifestyle commitments”, including his £22,000-a-month rented house in Wimbledon, southwest London.

He also owed the Swiss authorities five million francs (£4m) and separately just under one million euros (£800,000) in liabilities over a conviction for tax evasion and attempted tax evasion in Germany in 2002.

The court heard Becker’s bankruptcy resulted from a 4.6m euro (£3.85m) loan from private bank Arbuthnot Latham in 2013, and £1.2m, with a 25 percent interest rate, borrowed from British businessman John Caudwell, who founded Phones 4u, the following year.

He said bad publicity had damaged “brand Becker”, meaning he struggled to make enough money to pay off his debts, while his QC Jonathan Laidlaw said at the time of his bankruptcy Becker was too “trusting and reliant” on his advisers.