In it, Berkoff quite correctly summed up what is going on with the petulant child Donald Trump and his decision not to concede gracefully in America.
Speaking of the situation and of what caused coronavirus also, Berkoff remarked:
“Trump is a perfect example of Faust. He’ll do anything to signal his decrepitude to the public. Like Faust, those who crave power, experience and sex sacrifice their souls. We see a lot of this today when people will do anything to achieve a limited thrill. This horrible Covid is the result of this Faustian pact to kill and taste anything to achieve some kind of enlightenment and relief. To me, the hunters who go to Africa and kill just for the thrill are the sickest people on Earth. The wet markets in China and Thailand are full of the horror of slaughtering animals, and now we’re paying for it.”
The brilliant Mr. Berkoff is, as ever, spot on and today we once again salute his genius.
Just as Hamish, the first polar bear born in the UK in 25 years moves from Scotland to Yorkshire, our petition to ban the barbaric bear slayer Larysa Switlyk from Instagram shoots over 5,000 signatures
Hurrah for Hamish – In July, stage and screen legend Steven Berkoff penned a poem for The Steeple Times about a barbarian bear slayer. He quite rightly expressed his fury about this “ugly human beast,” but today we can share some good news on the polar bear front.
First reported in the Guardian this morning, the first polar bear born in the UK in twenty-five years was moved 400 miles from Scotland to Yorkshire yesterday. The 2.5-year old cub named Hamish has been “an incredible ambassador for his relatives in the wild, playing a crucial role in educating the public about threats faced by many species” according to the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland’s chief executive, David Field.
Speaking to the paper, he remarked:
“A critical part of our role as a wildlife conservation charity is education. Hamish has made a tremendous impression on the thousands of people who visited the park since his birth two and a half years ago, and the billions who saw the news around the world.”
“He has helped to highlight the threats many species face in the wild and the changes we can undertake to really make a difference.”
“Changes in the Arctic climate mean the sea ice that wild polar bears, and other animals, depend on for survival is shrinking and it is predicted this will significantly decrease population numbers over the next 40 years.”
Elsewhere this morning on Change.org, our petition to get the Trump supporting trailer trash Larysa Switlyk banned from Instagram has shot up from 4,800 to nearly 5,400 signatures in the last 24 hours. If you haven’t already signed it, please do so by clicking here and help get this massacring monster and her sick imagery banished from social media.
Hurrah for Hamish – Twisted twerp Larysa Switlyk has still not been banned from posting offensive content on Instagram in spite of sharing images of the alligators, bears, goats, peacocks, sheep and countless other poor creatures she’s massacred. We say: “SHAME ON INSTAGRAM” very loudly once again today.
Hurrah for Hamish – A video of Hamish the polar bear is a must watch to lift your spirits on the first day of Lockdown 2.
As Priti Patel is slammed by her neighbours as a ‘snitch,’ the Duke and Duchess of Sussex are voted “the famous couple Brits would least like to live next door to” along with Boris Johnson and Kerry Katona
Priti Patel – a wicked wench whom dislikes “minglin” (could someone teach her to pronounce the missing ‘g’?) – was quite rightly slammed as a snake and a snitch earlier this week for stating she’d report her neighbours if they had gatherings of more than six.
With one of the very people living next door to her stating to the Guardian: “I would live and let live in the first place” and adding: “[The government has] made a pig’s ear of the while job” of the ‘rule of six,’ this ludicrous woman was deservedly told “there are more important things to worry about than dobbing in your neighbour.”
Patel, quite frankly, is a petulant pest nobody in their right mind would want to live in the proximity of, but even more amusingly The Sun reported the Duke and Duchess of Susex have been named “the worst neighbours” possible by Brits in a survey by the charity fundraising site Omaze.
Elsewhere, Business Times reported that “Harry and Markle’s neighbours in Montecito are ‘super annoyed’ about the deluge of paparazzi in their once peaceful town. According to TMZ, photographers and tabloid press reporters circle in helicopters around the neighborhood up to four times a day just to catch the Sussexes in public places.”
Others unsurprisingly hitting the Omaze list were Gemma Collins, Boris Johnson and Kerry Katona, but most surprisingly the woman whose cakes have made the nation chubby Mary Berry was listed amongst those people would actually like to live next door to. What on earth would they want from her? Free cakes?
As Britain likely moves into further lockdowns, drug dealers are changing the way they operate and communicate; they now bizarrely demand customers ask: “Is now a good time?”
IS NOW A GOOD TIME? – In June, Misha Glenny – the author of McMafia and a fellow at the Berggruen Institute – penned a fascinating article for the Guardian about how organised crime has had to adapt due to coronavirus lockdown restrictions.
Glenny highlighted how it was “too risky for [drug] dealers to move around” in cities like London and how prices had risen as a result. He rather over generously suggested “criminals are humans too” and were “abiding by the rules [of lockdown],” but also pointed out that the growth in online crime had been accelerated by COVID-19.
In a series of WhatsApp messages seen recently by The Steeple Times between a reader who works in the financial services sector and a London based drug peddler, the way in which such people have changed the way they communicate with their “customers” was fascinatingly illustrated.
We share said criminal’s messages below and highlight how he now uses that devoid of utterly anything phrase “reaching out” to communicate with his customers via all means other than Sim phone calls and SMS messages. He begins:
I hope this message finds you well. Just reaching out to inform you that I have changed my number from (old number: +44XXXXXXXXX) to (new number: +44XXXXXXXXXXX). Please save new number as old one will soon be inactive. Please make contact on WhatsApp/Telegram/Signal only (no Sim phone calls or SMS messages please). And as always, when referring my services to friends/colleagues/family, please call/message me in advance to inform me that you have done or intend to do so. Please also kindly forward me their contact details. Apologies if you have already received this message from my previous broadcast. Thanks.
In a further message, said individual laid his “is now a good time?” message on thick and continued:
Thank you for using my service and thank you for your valued custom. Moving forward I want to lay out my terms and conditions. In order for you to receive the best service and customer care it is advisable that you abide by them. They are as follows:
I will be your main point of contact for any disputes/feedback.
When contacting me please remember to use WhatsApp only (unless I advise otherwise).
Please message only and don’t call unless I ask you to you to (very important).
The first message you send should always be “is now a good time?”
Don’t engage in further contact until you have had a response to the first message. This is for your safety.
If I am unavailable you will receive a message with clear instructions to follow. Please follow them.
I won’t allways [sic] be available to meet you in person, and in this event you will be allocated an alternative driver. However I cannot guarantee you will be allocated the same driver every occasion I am unavailable.
You will be able to request a particular driver if they are available.
Contact the driver through WhatsApp only, with the first message being “is now a good time?”
All drivers carry the same stock.
All of my products have a distinctive packaging/branding.
If product presentation/quality is not up to standard it means that it has probably been tampered with and in which case you should report back to me immediately.
Allways [sic] make your order clear to the driver and have cash ready before they depart.
When referring my services to friends/colleagues/family, please message me in advance to inform me that you have done or intend to do so. Please also kindly forward me their contact details. And remember to tell them to use WhatsApp only using the phrase “is now a good time?”
And last but not least, always treat the driver with the same respect you would expect to have reciprocated.
Once again thank you for your business and I look forward to hearing from you in the future.
Our typically middle class reader – someone astonishingly typical of the majority using cocaine in Britain and a member of a social group where abuse of this substance is more common than alcoholism – sensibly wrote back: “Now is NOT a good time” and ended the dialogue. Sadly, many others will act to the contrary and that’s what will keep this vile piece of toerag in business now and “allways” [sic].
Misha Glenny’s 2008 non-fiction book ‘McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld’ inspired the brilliant eight-chapter, 2018 BBC One series of the same name. A second eight-chapter series is due to be aired in due course.
Conservative councillor Karen Rampton is a bigot who picks on homeless people and she is someone whom should be named and shamed
Conservative councillor for Talbot and Branksome Woods Karen Rampton is a woman completely lacking in compassion.
Featured in an article in The Guardian on Thursday, bleached blonde bimbo Rampton remarked of homeless people in her area:
“We know that people leaving unattended belongings causes anxiety. Shopkeepers do not want people obstructing their doorways especially in these times of Covid.”
Mrs Rampton and her colleagues wants to fine homeless people “for sleeping in doorways” and “ban behaviour such as drinking alcohol in public.” She wishes to issue those than commit such ‘offences’ with penalties of £1,000 in spite of the fact that they are likely penniless and she was rightly branded utterly cruel.
Of her Liberal Democrat councillor Millie Earl rightly remarked: “[She is] very cruel. It’s completely counterproductive to hand out a fine to someone who is already in poverty.”
Shame on Karen Rampton. We very much hope she is forced into penury and onto the streets herself. Let’s see how she likes it.
Councillor Rampton unsurprisingly has been involved in sagas unfortunate in the past. She claimed to be the victim of a stalker in 2008. Here is a woman whom is most deservedly disliked. Shame on her.
Matthew Steeples expresses lament for London’s post-coronavirus future – here is a city that faces an exodus and recession
This morning in The Guardian, Emma Brockes – a “British writer in New York” according to her Twitter handle – penned an article about how that city is “going back to the 1970s” as a “long overdue correction to the ravaging effect of high finance.”
Her fascinating analysis of how the “post-Covid hotspot” is set to lose its middle classes and “become more dangerous,” could also be applied to London.
Aside from families releasing that they desire outside space rather than cramped flats in the pandemic, the exodus to the suburbs and beyond is most definitely occurring. Property prices are rising in more rural areas and workers will commute less and less.
The new era ahead involves working from home and the consequences were explained to me recently by a city restaurateur. When allowed, he reopened for a week – but hardly anybody came. He found the city empty of his usual regulars, closed his doors and will try again in September.
Sandwich shops such as Pret have seen a sharp decline in revenue and tailors are suffering as well. People no longer need a Savile Row suit and instead wear their shorts or dressing gowns whilst they work. Many shops have closed – some would have closed anyway given the high street was already failing – and stabbings have sadly dramatically risen.
Dick Whittington famously fictionally arrived in London expecting the streets to be paved with gold. He initially found to the contrary and ended up cold and hungry and now many will find the same. With an expected second wave of coronavirus this winter and the worst recession in history underway, London needs to wake up and smell the coffee.
Owen Jones has yet again proven himself to be nothing but a self-indulgent berk in banging on about ‘cancel culture’ and the right ‘playing the victim’ card
Owen Jones just cannot help himself. A constant attention seeker, the author of Chavs has waded into the debate about ‘cancel culture’ – a new description for “the withdrawal of support or admiration for someone after an alleged misstep” – and as per usual made an utter arse of himself.
Aside from correctly describing himself as “sad” on his Twitter handle, Jones rarely gets much right and in his Guardian column today, this left-wing loudmouth achieved nothing in banging on about another of his favourite topics, that of ‘victimhood.’
Forever one prone to leaping on the status of being a ‘victim’ himself, Jones’ argued “millennials complaining on Twitter” are “better to be seen as the victim rather than the aggressor” when it comes to “brutal battlegrounds of the culture war.” His oversimplified view was rightly “slapped down” as “destroying democracy” previously last week by Piers Morgan and again now it should be dealt with similarly. If indeed anything should be cancelled, it is quite simply Owen Jones.
Rolls-Royce owned by “maverick” Demon Internet dot-com millionaire Cliff Stanford to be auctioned; an au pair he employed was tragically murdered by a British serial sex offender in Spain; he was convicted of “email spying” in a scandal featuring gerrymanderer Dame Shirley Porter
Cliff Stanford is best-known for having established the early dot-com success story Demon Internet in 1992. He had a (boom, boom) “demon touch” and sold the company for £66 million in 1998.
After pocketing £30 million personally, one of Stanford’s first moves was to buy a private plane and “one of the most lavish Rolls-Royces then available.”
He paid the equivalent (with a discount) of £265,000 today for the opulent Rolls-Royce and declared it: “My favourite present to myself.”
The 1998 Rolls-Royce Silver Spur is now to be auctioned for less than a tenth of that price with a lower estimate of just £18,000.
Stanford’s Spanish au pair was tragically murdered in 1999 and subsequently in a totally unconnected series of events, he was convicted of “email spying” on notorious Conservative politician and gerrymanderer Dame Shirley Porter and her son.
According to his personal Twitter account, Stanford is now based in Tallinn, Estonia; he recently tweeted in support of Dominic Cummings, but neglected to mention if he would have loaned his motor for the spinner’s infamous Barnard Castle drive.
In 1998, “flamboyant” Internet pioneer Cliff Stanford paid the equivalent of £265,000 in today’s money for a brand-new motor. He did not opt for the eco-friendly kind-of-car that today’s tech titans drift around in, but instead slam dunked and went for the ultimate symbol of flash – a Rolls-Royce Silver Spur with every conceivable extra.
Stanford’s long wheel base ride – a vehicle that would have been the envy even of Charles Frere, the business tycoon bounder of Howards’ Way, in terms of its lavishness – personified excess and reflected the persona of a man whom “laughingly” considered getting the numbers ‘666’ incorporated into the dial-up for his Demon Internet company’s software.
The Rolls-Royce Silver Spirit and the longer wheelbase Silver Spur (and their Bentley equivalents) were the favoured mode of conveyance of business moguls in the 1980s and 1990s. Charles Frere (played by the late Tony Anholt, died 2002), a stereotypical example of such a character, was regularly seen in such motors in the BBC classic ‘Howards’ Way’ also.
Born in Southend-on-Sea, Essex, Clifford Stanford started his career as an accountant, but “found his way to the Internet via a love of computers.” He hit the jackpot with Demon Internet in 1992 and after selling that company to Scottish Telecom for £66 million, claimed his empire would be “bigger than Branson’s” according to the Guardian.
Speaking to the paper in December 2001, he continued: “I always wanted to be wealthy. Money doesn’t buy happiness but lack of it can lead to misery. Now I really enjoy my life, I do whatever I like and no-one tells me otherwise” and next he set up another venture, Redbus Investments, with Dame Shirley Porter’s son, John, as chairman. It listed on the stock exchange in March 2000 and the company’s activities included not only Internet hosting, but also a landmine disposal system and forays into football and popular music.
Redbus, according to ZDNet in Sept2005, was where “Stanford’s trouble seemed to start.” Kiss-and-tell scandals involving a “champagne fueled romp” at Claridge’s and his being banned from the hotel ensued, whilst in 1999 his Spanish au pair was murdered by a serial British sex offender named Tony King – who was only jailed in 2006 after a previous wrongly convicted suspect was cleared in 2002.
In 2001, the Guardian reported on the tycoon’s associations with Max Clifford – with a plainly hoodwinked Stanford remarking: “Max always has loads of really interesting people at his events” of the long since disgraced and now thankfully dead paedophile – and mentioned an unsuccessful investment of £1 million in a “badly managed” girl band called Girls@play. It had The Apprentice’s Alan Sugar’s niece as its lead singer, but ultimately was “a complete disaster really,” the businessman lamented.
By 2005, Redbus had unraveled spectacularly and in September that year, Sandford was convicted of intercepting emails belonging to his former friend John Porter. He tried to claim his actions were legal, but after being given a suspended sentence and ordered to pay a fine of £20,000 and £7,000 in prosecution costs, a later appeal was denied.
Divorced, a father of two and reinvented as an “innovation strategist” according to his LinkedIn.com page, Stanford is now is based in Tallinn, Estonia with his American-German science fiction writer partner Sylvia Spruck Wrigley. Aside from a website named May.be that lists their many projects, the tech expert is an enthusiastic chess player and user of Twitter.
As well as tweeting enthusiastically about a “clean break Brexit” and complaining about Amazon, Turkish Airlines and the Estonian take on fish and chips on the social media site, he recently came out in support of Dominic Cummings. Of Boris Johnson’s puppet master’s recent problems, Stanford surmised: “Witch hunt.”
Historics Classic and Sportscar Auctioneers will sell Cliff Stanford’s Rolls-Royce Silver Spur on the 18th July and have set an estimate of just £18,000 to £22,000. They describe the vehicle as “one of the highest specified cars we have seen and presents well in black with black leather seats, carpets and headlining,” but neglect to detail any of the high jinxes that this larger-than-life character no doubt conducted from its rear seating area.
Cliff Martin Stanford (born 1954) – The Names & Numbers
18th July 2020 – Cliff Stanford’s one-owner-from new 1998 Rolls-Royce Silver Spur – registration S110 NGN – to be auctioned by Historics Classic and Sportscar Auctioneers with an estimate of £18,000 to £22,000 ($22,200 to $27,100, €19,800 to €24,200 or درهم81,600 to درهم99,700) at their Windsorview Lakes sale.
June 2009 – Co-founded Power Ethernet. He describes this firm as bringing “disruptive technology to fruition.”
September 2005 – Convicted and given a suspended sentence of 6 months and a fine of £20,000 ($24,700, €22,000 or درهم90,600). A later hearing denied leave to appeal in February 2006.
2003 – Charged under the Computer Misuse Act and the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 with the interception of emails between Jonathan Porter, one-time chairman of Redbus Interhouse, and his disgraced mother, Dame Shirley Porter – a woman best known for the “homes for votes” scandal in Westminster.
March 2000 – Floated Redbus Interhouse on the stock market.
October 1999 – Stanford’s Dutch-Spanish au pair, Rocío Wanninkhof (1979 – 1999), is abducted and stabbed to death. He offered a £50,000 ($61,000, €54,000 or درهم224,000) reward immediately and then doubled the sum in September 2003 “to anyone who could provide information” according to The Independent. After the estranged female lover of Wanninkhof’s mother was wrongly convicted for the murder in 2001 and subsequently cleared, a British sex offender, Tony King, was jailed for the killing in 2006 for 19 years.
1998 – Cliff Stanford paid £150,000 ($185,000, €165,000 or درهم680,000) for a 1998 Rolls-Royce Silver Spur, the “last production chassis number for UK sale.” He supposedly secured a discount of £20,000 ($24,700, €22,000 or درهم90,600) on the list price from dealers Jack Barclay and added extras including “a wine cooler to rear armrest, centenary door panels, picnic tables with separate stowage compartment, TV monitor/video to rear compartment and electrically adjustable lumbar support.”
1998 – Founded Redbus Investments four days after the sale of Demon Internet.
1998 – Sold Demon Internet to Scottish Telecom for £66 million ($81 million, €73 million or درهم299 million) with 172,000 subscribers. Stanford became an early dot-com multi-millionaire, personally netted £30 million ($37 million, €33 million or درهم136 million) and moved to Brussels “to avoid capital gains tax” according to the Guardian.
June 1992 – Cliff Stanford founded Demon Internet with 200 subscribers. He had been brought up in Southend-on-Sea, Essex by his single-parent mother and began his career in accountancy.
The turbo-charged long wheelbase Rolls-Royce Silver Spur is described as a “classic machine.”The interior is in as new condition.The black leather seats have been well-cared for.The model was the first Rolls-Royce to feature a retractable Spirit of Ecstasy mascot on its bonnet.Rolls-Royce gave the car a 6.75-litre V8 engine.
Double artist’s studio in Glebe Place, Chelsea that has been home to a fugitive billionaire oligarch, a Tolstoy and a man suspected of being Jack the Ripper slashed in price by 25%; it is now subject to a forced sale
House in Glebe Place, Chelsea, SW3 created from two artist’s studios reduced in price from just under £9 million to £6.95 million as part of a sale forced by authorities.
It was home to the now in exile fugitive billionaire Sergei Pugachev and his ex-partner Alexandra Tolstoy from 2009.
Previous occupants include the artist Sir William Rothenstein and before him his fellow artist friend Walter Sickert – a man the author Patricia Cornwell spent £6 million trying to prove to be the serial killer Jack the Ripper.
Alexandra Tolstoy bleated to the ‘Mail Online’ about how she’d been “evicted” from the house 12 days before the coronavirus lockdown in May; her most recent Instagram posts, however, suggest she is still in residence along with her children.
German born artist Walter Sickert RA (1860 – 1942) took a great interest in the gruesome crimes of Jack the Ripper. He believed he had lodged in a room used by the serial killer and from the 1970s onwards, authors and historians including Patricia Cornwell have suggested he could have been the murderer himself (or possibly his accomplice).
For a time, Sickert – whom counted the newspaper baron Lord Beaverbrook (1879 – 1964) amongst his closest friends and a man lauded by some as “the greatest British painter between Turner and Bacon” – lived in an artist’s studio at 53 Glebe Place in Chelsea and in 1894, a fellow artist, Sir William Rothenstein (1872 – 1945), took the property over. According to Wendy Baron, in her 2012 study of The Camden Town Group in Context for the Tate, the latter was “ever amazed by Sickert’s ‘taste for the dingy lodging-house atmosphere,’ and his ‘genius for discovering the dreariest house and most forbidding rooms in which to work.’”
More recently, in 2009, the now fugitive oligarch Sergei Pugachev – a man nicknamed ‘Putin’s Banker’ (until the one-time billionaire and the President spectacularly fell out) – rented 53 Glebe Place along with his then partner Alexandra Tolstoy. The house was subsequently purchased by a trust in 2010 and in 2011, the adjoining house, 54 Glebe Place, was bought and the two combined to become Pugachev and Tolstoy’s London residence.
The resulting 3,868 square foot single family residence – which includes 3 reception rooms, 5 bedrooms and 5 bathrooms and an interior by designers from Sibyl Colefax and John Fowler described as “exuberant” by House & Garden – features a 57-foot south facing façade and ceiling heights of upto 22-feet. In total, it is believed the price paid for the two properties was around £8.325 million prior to subsequent renovations.
In the years that followed, 53 and 54 Glebe Place have become part of the legal tussle between the Russian government, Sergei Pugachev, his ex-wife Galina Arkhipova, his father Victor Pugachev and his Instagram loving ex-partner Alexandra Tolstoy. With Pugachev Jr. in exile in France, Ms Tolstoy has remained in residence but in 2019, the courts decided the house would have to be sold. It was placed on the market through Savills for £8.975 million.
With Ms Tolstoy subsequently ludicrously claiming at one point she could not live on £10,000 per week or without two drivers and a live-in doctor and then more recently featuring in an hour long BBC documentary in May titled The Countess and the Russian Billionaire, the sordid saga has become very public. Now, this week, the house has been relaunched for just £6.95 million again through Savills.
Whilst a single studio house featured in The Steeple Times in September 2015 was marketed for the seemingly sky-high sum of £5.45 million (it sold in March 2020 for just £4.5 million), even the now reduced figure for the combined 53 and 54 Glebe Place still seems very punchy. On that basis, we imagine, Alexandra Tolstoy may be able to stay there for some time still yet; as she herself once remarked: “We’re just surviving.”
Pictured top: 53 and 54 Glebe Place (left) were bought for a combined sum of around £8.325 million in 2010 and 2011. The resulting house – for which Savills states “steps are currently being taken to obtain the necessary statutory consents” for combination – is now on the market for just £6.95 million; Fugitive oligarch Sergei Pugachev (top right) and socialite ‘adventurer’ Alexandra Tolstoy (bottom right).
The house in question – 53 and 54 Glebe Place, Chelsea, London, SW3 5JB, United Kingdom.Sick Dick? Walter Sickert photographed in 1911 by George Beresford (top left); ‘Jack the Ripper’s Bedroom’ painted by Sickert in 1906 – 1907, the oil on canvas was bequeathed by Mrs Mary Cicely Tatlock to the Manchester Art Gallery in 1980 (top right); The setting for the painting and the home of Walter Sickert, 6 Mornington Crescent, Camden, NW1 now has a Greater London Council blue plaque commemorating the painter and etcher’s residence there.
In 2017, best-selling author Patricia Cornwell claimed she had spent over £5.6 million “proving” that Walter Sickert was Jack the Ripper.Old Battersea House, 30 Vicarage Crescent, Battersea, London, SW11 3LD, United Kingdom is another house that Pugachev and Tolstoy plainly purchased at a crazy price. They paid £12.5 million and it is now for sale for just £9.975 million. The house was previously owned by the late billionaire publishing magnate Malcolm Forbes.
The Names & Numbers – 53 and 54 Glebe Place, Chelsea, London, SW3 5JB, United Kingdom
June 2020 – The combined house is relaunched for sale at a reduced price of £6.95 million ($8.62 million, €7.69 million or درهم31.66 million) by Savills, a discount of 23% on the previous asking price.
May 2020 – Alexandra Tolstoy claimed she had “been evicted from her multi-million home with only 12 days notice during the coronavirus outbreak” in comments to the Mail Online. Posts in June 2020, however, indicate her still to be in residence at Glebe Place with her children.
January 2020 – The Evening Standard reported that Galina Arkhipova “lost her bid to win a share” of the Glebe Place property. Chief Master Marsh dismissed Arkhipova’s claim on the basis of her “casual approach” to “complying with a court order requiring her to make full disclosure of her bank statements and access to legal documents, as well as her ‘unexplained failure’ to attend the latest hearing or instruct lawyers.”
2019 – Placed for sale for £8.975 million ($11.134 million, €9.929 million or درهم40.890 million) through Savills after the order of the courts.
October 2018 – At a “commercial court hearing, the judge, Master Price, made an order compelling the sale of Pugachev’s London home” according to the Guardian. A deadline was set for Ms Tolstoy to move out of January 2019 and at this time also, Pugachev’s former wife, Galina Arkhipova, “said she was also laying claim to the Glebe Place property, arguing that the house was a matrimonial asset.”
February 2016 – In absentia, Sergei Pugachev is found guilty of contempt at the high court in London and sentenced to two years in prison. The “convenient dissident” was described as someone who “could not be trusted” and subsequently, a warrant for his arrest was issued. To this day, Mr Pugachev has positioned himself as an innocent man and a “victim of Putin’s revenge.”
March 2012 – Mr Pugachev changed the locks at Glebe Place and “refused to let [Ms Tolstoy] back in. Pugachev subsequently visited Count Nikolai Tolstoy, the father of Alexandra Tolstoy, and explained that the Glebe Place house was controlled by a trust and that “he had bought Old Battersea House in a trust for Ms Tolstoy and the children… Old Battersea House was to be the family home and he and Ms Tolstoy were going to live there with the children.”
December 2011 – Old Battersea House is purchased for £12.5 million ($15.5 million, €13.8 million or درهم56.9 million) supposedly in a trust to benefit Alexandra Tolstoy and her three children with Sergei Pugachev. That house was subsequently offered for sale in 2017 for £12 million ($14.8 million, €13.3 million or درهم54.7 million) and is now on the market for just £9.975 million ($12.370 million, €11.031 million or درهم45.429 million) through Savills in June 2020.
July 2011 – Assuming the legal document figures to be exact, the total paid to purchase 53 and 54 Glebe Place was £8.325 million ($10.324 million, €9.208 million or درهم37.915 million).
July 2011 – 54 Glebe Place is purchased for a sum undisclosed on Land Registry Records through a trust. The two houses are subsequently merged as one. At around this time, Victor Pugachev “provided another loan of £4.2 million ($5.2 million, €4.6 million or درهم19.1 million) to Redflame as a loan” for the purchase. Legal documents state: “Later accounting documents show the lender as Mr Pugachev and include a loan agreement executed by Mr Pugachev and Redflame.”
July 2010 – 53 Glebe Place is purchased for a sum undisclosed on Land Registry Records through a trust, the ownership deed reportedly being in the names of Sergei Pugachev and Victor Pugachev (his father, as “beneficiary and Protector”). At around this time, Victor Pugachev “provided £4.125 million ($5.115 million, €4.562 million or درهم18.788 million) to Redflame as a loan” for the purchase.
2009 – Sergei Pugachev and Alexandra Tolstoy rented 53 Glebe Place as their London home.
July 2009 – 54 Glebe is sold for £2.55 million ($3.16 million, €2.82 million or درهم11.61 million) according to the Land Registry.
January 2005 – 54 Glebe is sold for £2.175 million ($2.698 million, €2.405 million or درهم9.906 million) according to the Land Registry.
March 2001 – 54 Glebe is sold for £1.8 million ($2.2 million, €2 million or درهم8.2 million) according to the Land Registry.
March 1995 – 54 Glebe is sold for £900,000 ($1.1 million, €995,000 or درهم4.1 million) acording to the Land Registry.
‘The Steeple Times’ analyses the selections for a somewhat damp Gold Cup Day at ‘Royal Ascot At Home’ – very much a day to stay indoors and watch Stradavarius, Frankie Dettori and Sir John Gosden
Rain could shake everything up today at ‘Royal Ascot At Home’ – as this year’s closed doors meeting has been branded – and though Stradivarius will not especially love any significant downpours, he is the horse that will surely be the highlight of Gold Cup day.
Trained by the Sir John Gosden, ridden by Frankie Dettori and owned by Bjorn Nielson, here is a horse seeking to secure a Royal Ascot hat-trick. Speaking to the Daily Mail’s Marcus Townend, Sir John commented: “He is in good form” whilst GG.co.uk concluded: “Stradivarius, and Frankie Dettori of course, are the undoubted top bill on day three of Royal Ascot 2020.”
Obvious Options
1.50pm – Wolferton Stakes (15 runners) – Ryan Moore and A. P. O’Brien’s Sir Dragonet at 12/5 has been branded as “among Thursday’s worthy support acts” (GG.co.uk).
Racing Post not especially enthusiastic: “Shade disappointing since close fifth in last year’s Derby but still has time on his side.”
3.35pm – Gold Cup (8 runners) – The horse of the day is Stradivarius at 8/11 (The Telegraph, The Sun TREBLE).
Racing Post concludes: “Top-class stayer, including winning this race for the last two years; hard to beat.”
4.40pm – Sandringham Stakes – Sir John Gosden’s African Dream at 13/8 (The Telegraph, Guardian). As Simon Rowlands of At The Races sensibly concludes: “The very short price makes him unplayable to me.” Watch and enjoy.
Chris Cook of the Guardian comments: “It is hard to resist the claims of African Dream, who ran way above her rating when second at Newbury last week. Whether she can reproduce that effort in these very different circumstances is a fair question but her connections give her every chance.”
Darker Horses
1.15pm – Golden Gates Handicap (16 runners) – Sticking with the combo of the Dettori-Gosden dream team, Hypothetical is an appealing each way at 9/2 from 4/1 earlier (Radio 4).
Racing Post says: “Opening mark is reasonable and profile points to strong potential for improvement” with their verdict being: “Despite the big field Acquitted makes a good bit of appeal. Hypothetical may be next best, ahead of Maori Knight.”
‘Templegate’ for The Sun adds: “Hypothetical comes from John Gosden and Frankie Dettori and is dropping in class after a solid fourth in the Group 3 Classic Trial at Sandown on comeback. He went well until the lack of a recent run appeared to take its toll. It would be a surprise if he doesn’t take a step forward from that.”
3.35pm – Gold Cup (8 runners) – An each way on the James Doyle-Charlie Appleby combo Cross Counter could be a more appealing each way at 11/1 (The Sun ‘Next Best’).
Racing Post says: “Held behind Stradivarius when in the frame in this (4th) & at Goodwood (3rd); could be 2nd.”
4.10pm – Britannia Stakes (24 runners) – An each way on Ralph Beckett’s Great Ambassador at 12/1 (Guardian NAP, At The Races) could be worthwhile.
Chris Cook of The Guardian says: “His final outing as a juvenile suggested Great Ambassador was in line for a big three-year-old season. From a hot yard and drawn on the favoured side, he is on a handy rating in view of some of his form, which includes a close second in Pyledriver’s maiden.”
Hugh Taylor for At The Races says: “Great Ambassador had five runs as a 2yo and might look too exposed for a race like this, but those runs really do stand up to close inspection… I think he’s capable of proving much better than his current mark when everything drops right, and although he lacks a recent run, he looks well worth chancing on his reappearance, especially from a potentially handy draw… He carries a 5lb penalty here, but goes up 12lb from Saturday, and given he’s a keen-going type who promises to be well suited by the demands of a big-field handicap, he has clear claims here.”
Racing Post adds: “Hacked up on final 2yo start; should stay 1m; enters calculations.”
Also in the 4.10pm – Britannia Stakes (24 runners) – Our wildcard is Richard Hannon trained Ziggle Pops at 22/1 from 20/1 earlier (Radio 4).
Racing Post says: “Came home strongly to beat a few of these in 7f AW handicap; up 5lb; should stay 1m.”
With no Ladies Day fashion parade due to lockdown, today is one to stay indoors, pour yourself a glass of something special and enjoy a happy afternoon’s racing. Cheers to y’all!
