The Masons Stole My House
By Simon Regan
Scallywag Magazine Issue 25

A tale against corruption in Greenwich involving a solicitor

An astonishing tale of one woman's battle against corruption in Greenwich council involving a struck-off solicitor convicted for fraud points directly to a conspiracy amongst prominent freemasons to wrongfully repossess council properties and throw the rightful owners onto the streets.
        Car accident victim Mrs. Riley and her daughter and parents were very happy to take advantage of the Tory right-to-buy policy and bought their council house in Greenwich, let the house to tenants, and moved to Lincolnshire. At this stage all the proceedings were handled by local solicitors Hudgell and Co.
        Some time later they were horrified to be notified that the tenants had been evicted and the house repossessed by the assistant borough solicitor Leslie Oldman. He had manipulated the order after it was found that Hudgell and Co. had failed to pay the ground rent of a tiny part of the property - amounting to a mere £20.66.
        Angry and confused Mrs, Riley, still confined to a wheelchair, began to look into just what had gone on. When she did so she became more and more suspicious, bogged down in what she soon realised was a huge and complicated conspiracy to con her out of her property. She is still fighting on every front- At this moment the family are suing: The London Borough of Greenwich, Hudgell and partners, Solicitors Bridge McFarland, John Smith, and Green D'Sa, John Cartwright, former SDP MP; Circuit Judge John Adams, the Chief Clerk of Woolwich County Court, and the chairman of Greenwich housing committee, Peter Challis.

Masons All

They soon found out, by acquiring a copy of the Lincolnshire Freemason's handbook, that all the solicitors they had used (and as time went by they used most firms in Lincs.) were listed as Masons. More important they were able to expose Leslie Oldman architect of the whole devious scheme. With a mixture of delight and consternation they proved he had been struck off as a solicitor ten years before for sustained forgery and misuse of his client funds - a heinous crime for any solicitor. Yet he was still signing his name as "Assistant Borough Solicitor". They brought this to the attention of just about everyone, but Oldman is still employed by the council.
        Mrs. Riley is now convinced that a regular racket has been taking place in Greenwich for a number of years. It goes like this: A family buys its council house, but solicitors acting for them fail to pay a paltry sum and Oldman is able to step in and repossess. The house is then sold for a song and the partners collect the difference. This time, however, they hadn't realised Mrs. Riley' tenacity.

Little Shit

When we contacted Oldman he was abusive and he tried to bluff and blunder his way through an explanation. He agreed to meet us, then put it off. He finally ended all conversation saying: "You're a little shit" and hung up, he could not deny, however, that he had a criminal conviction and had been struck off. "I'm retiring soon, so it won't matter," he boasted.
        Meanwhile, Mrs Riley began looking into Hudgell and Co. She found that it was a partner in the firm, Nicholas Worden Hart, working from their Woolwich branch who had failed to pay the £20.66 and that another partner, Anthony Jepson, was a former colleague of Oldman's at Greenwich.

The Pearly King

One of the men Oldman has been dealing with consistently during his years as "assistant solicitors" is a Greenwich wheeler-dealer called Danny Dalton. Dalton invented a nice little scam which was to cost several families dear. He persuaded them they needed help in getting the best deal on the 'right-to-buy' policy. He would pay them £15,000 and they would pay him rent while he arranged mortgages for them, then, quite suddenly, they would be evicted.
        This happened to, among many others, the pearly king of St. Pancras, Alf Dole. His deal with Dalton was done in the latter's large Shooter's Hill property. The money was duly paid over, but only weeks later an eviction order was sought successfully and police broke down Dole's door to help throw him out. Dole is joining Mrs, Riley's campaign to expose Oldman, who has remained a kingpin in all the right-to-buy transactions.

Denials

The only person able to talk to us at the council itself was the press officer Julian Scholar who proved extremely evasive. At first he denied ever hearing of Dalton, but later admitted there had been a police inquiry into Dalton's connection with the council. However, he refused to supply the name of the investigating officer. The police were equally uncooperative claiming that it was too time consuming to go back over the files. As usual in such inquiries the long arm of the Masonic handshake had quickly quashed any inquiry.
        Meanwhile, Mrs Riley fights on, while with the full knowledge of Greenwich council, a convicted fraudster continues to operate his dirty deals.

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