The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is seeking to reopen its case against Renwick Haddow.
The relevant motion was submitted on April 24, 2025, at the New York Southern District Court. The aim of the case reopening is to modify the terms of the existing asset freeze.
The Commission filed its Complaint in this matter on June 30, 2017. The SEC’s Complaint alleges that Haddow committed two securities fraud schemes, the earlier of which began in approximately the spring of 2015.
On August 7, 2017, the Court issued a preliminary injunction, continuing, among other things, the asset freeze on Haddow. The Asset Freeze Order requires Haddow and all institutions or persons acting on his behalf to “hold and retain within their control and otherwise prevent . . . any withdrawal, transfer, pledge, encumbrance, assignment, dissipation, concealment or other disposal . . . of any assets, funds, or other property (including…real or personal property…wherever located).”
On September 10, 2019, the Court entered a bifurcated consent judgment as to Haddow resolving the injunctive relief the Commission sought but leaving open for later resolution the issue of monetary relief. On December 5, 2019, the Court directed the Clerk of Court to close the case.
On July 27, 2016, approximately eleven months before the Commission filed its Complaint, Haddow’s assets were placed in bankruptcy in the United Kingdom. Joint trustees were appointed for the bankruptcy estate. According to the Joint Trustees, under United Kingdom law, Haddow’s existing assets automatically vested in one of the Joint Trustees on that date.
The Joint Trustees have identified two assets – a villa in Corfu, Greece, and another in Marrakech, Morocco – that Haddow acquired before he began the earlier of the fraudulent schemes alleged in the Complaint and that the Joint Trustees seek to sell for the benefit of the bankruptcy estate.
The Joint Trustees have taken the position that the funds used to purchase the Properties could not have come from the victims of the fraud alleged in the Complaint and that ownership of the Properties was properly vested in one of the Joint Trustees before the Commission filed its Complaint.
The Joint Trustees have further expressed concern that the Court’s Asset Freeze Order may preclude a sale of the Properties. For this reason, the Joint Trustees have requested that the SEC “confirm that the SEC do[es] not oppose the application and the realisation of the villa[s] for the benefit of the bankruptcy estate.”
The Commission therefore seeks a modification of the Asset Freeze Order to carve out the Properties from the Order’s scope so that the Joint Trustees may effectuate their sale for the benefit of the bankruptcy estate.
Haddow has pleaded guilty in a related criminal case. His sentencing is scheduled for June 18, 2025.
