The Tribune

By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Senior Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

FASHION mogul Peter Nygard is facing more legal problems as the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York moves to seize five California properties connected to him, including a Marina del Rey condo where he hosted some of his infamous “pamper parties.”

CBC News, which obtained court documents pertaining to the matter, reported recently that US Attorney for the Southern District of New York Audrey Strauss filed a forfeiture bill on April 29 as part of its criminal case against Nygard. The document became open to the public in late May.

Nygard was charged in December 2020 with sex trafficking and racketeering offences that arose out of what lawyers called “a decades-long pattern of criminal conduct involving at least dozens of victims in the United States, the Bahamas and Canada, among other locations.”

Since then, Nygard, 79, has lost his effort to secure bail and remains imprisoned in Headingley Correctional Centre in Canada. He is gearing up for what is expected to be a lengthy extradition battle which is scheduled to begin in November.

CBC News reported: “The government is asking the court to authorise the seizure of properties it says belong to Edson’s Investments Inc and Brause Investments Inc, two American companies Strauss says are controlled by Nygard.

“Nygard’s name doesn’t appear on any of the company documents for Edson’s and Brause but two of his former top company executives — Tiina Tulikorpi and David Paton — are listed as directors. In previous court documents, Strauss said evidence gathered through the execution of search warrants shows the companies are all connected and Nygard controls them.

“‘Nygard’s company emails show, for instance, that Nygard controlled Edson’s and directed that money be moved between Edson’s accounts and others,’ Strauss wrote in court filings in the extradition case.

“Strauss said Nygard has been liquidating assets for several months and has been using top level executives to do it. ‘During the past several months, certain United States-based entities controlled by Nygard have sold a number of real estate holdings in California, totalling nearly $70m.”