Former shipowner Nobu Su has been released from prison after just over a year but has been ordered to stay in the UK until further notice, ahead of another court hearing.

The Taiwanese national, once one of Asia's richest shipowners, walked free from Pentonville Prison in north London on Thursday morning.

He had been scheduled to be released on Saturday but was released early ahead of the Easter long weekend.

Cypriot shipowner Polys Haji-Ioannou, who is chasing Su for payment of a $60m judgment debt, made an application for Su's jail time to be continued, but this was denied on Wednesday by Judge David Foxton, according to a written judgment.

However, Foxton ruled that Su is still considered a flight risk.

Su has suggested that he has "no motivation" to flee the jurisdiction, but has also made submissions that he is concerned for his mother, who lives in Tokyo, Foxton said.

Foxton ordered that Su must stay in England and Wales and make daily check-ins with police in London.

A tale of two shipowners at war

July 2008
Polys Haji-Ioannou agrees to buy Nobu Su’s position in the forward freight market via his company Lakatamia Shipping. Su agrees to repurchase the position after one month.

October 2008-October 2009
Su repays some but not all of his outstanding liability against Lakatamia, refusing to pay the balance of $37.9m.

March 2011
Lakatamia issues a claim for breach of contract in London against Su and the TMT Group.

August 2011
A court-ordered freezing injunction is effected on Su’s assets worldwide.

November 2014
A judge finds in favour of Haji-Ioannou and Lakatamia, awarding them $37.9m.

January 2015
A further judgment orders Su to pay an additional $9.9m in interest.

November 2015
Two villas owned by Su are sold in Monaco.

February 2016
Su is ordered to pay the claimants’ legal costs of £1.1m, bringing the total judgment debt to $57m.

February 2017
The net proceeds from the villas’ sale is transferred to lawyers of Cresta Overseas, of which Su was beneficial owner via his company Portview Holdings.

March 2017
Sale proceeds transferred from Cresta to the Taipei bank account of Up Shipping.

February 2019
Freezing order effected against Su's mother, Toshiko Morimoto, Cresta and Portview.

March 2019
Su is jailed for 21 months for contempt of court.

September 2019
London's Court of Appeal refuses to grant Su permission to challenge his prison sentence. Su offers to purge one count of contempt with partial repayment of the court award.

February 2020
On 11 February, Su is found guilty of two further counts of contempt and receives an extra four months in prison. He had been due for release on 12 February.

April 2020
Su released from prison on 9 April.

July 2020
Su files for bankruptcy in London.

July 2021
Su's bankruptcy is annulled by a London court. A week later, a judge sends him back to prison.

Photo: John Allan/Creative Commons

UK ports will also receive an alert to prevent Su leaving the country.

After having his passport seized at Heathrow Airport last year, Su attempted to leave England by getting a taxi to Liverpool, where he tried to board a ferry to Ireland. He was later apprehended by police.

TradeWinds understands that Su will be staying with a contact from the shipping industry.

Foxton declined to issue Su with an electronic tag, saying that that decision was not for the court to make.

Disclosure orders

Lawyers for Haji-Ioannou and his company Lakatamia Shipping—the claimants to whom Su owes the judgment debt—are continuing their efforts to trace enforceable assets belonging to Su in order to recoup the outstanding $60m.

Haji-Ioannou's legal team has obtained a court order that requires Su to identify his social media and email accounts to Lakatamia and a court-appointed independent lawyer, and to give the lawyer access to the accounts by providing necessary passwords.

Su has said he has forgotten the passwords, so Foxton ordered him to sign mandates to each of his known email and social media providers, authorising disclosure of the accounts.

"The order which Lakatamia seeks is one which in effect, takes the process of giving disclosure out of Mr Su's own hands," Foxton said.

Playing the system

The parties will reconvene in the near future at a court hearing in London, a date for which has not yet been set.

Su has sought to adjourn the hearing, stating that he did not want to incriminate himself and that he wanted time to instruct a lawyer.

"He also suggested that the amount of the judgment was wrong and made a number of submissions connected with what he said was his ability to assist in finding a cure for Covid-19," Foxton wrote in his judgment.

Citing a range of reasons, Foxton ruled that the next hearing should proceed.

"In short, I have been reluctantly driven to the conclusion that Mr Su is someone who seeks to 'play the system', and who seeks to exploit the Court's natural desire to achieve fair hearings by continually pointing to some factor which is said to require an adjournment or delay," he wrote.

Su's assets worldwide have been subject to a freezing injunction since 2011.

Earlier this year, the claimants unearthed three properties in New York that they claim are owned but ­undisclosed by Su.

The claimants are still trying to get Su to disclose further information about the three apartments and his financial connection to them.

The London court last year found Su had breached the asset injunction by selling two villas in Monaco, which resulted in him being jailed for contempt.