A former executive and three ex-directors of Aegean Marine Petroleum Network are being sued, accused of helping the bunkering giant’s founder, Dimitris Melissanidis, perpetrate and cover up an alleged $300m fraud scheme.

The alleged scheme involved six companies connected either ­directly to Melissanidis or to associates that are accused of getting phoney business deals or other preferential treatment in connection with a fuel storage facility at ­Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates. The defendants in the lawsuit are accused of ignoring the dealings, landing the company in bankruptcy.

“Once the full extent of [Melissanidis’] conduct came to light, it was clear the company was ­hopelessly insolvent, rendering it ­unable to ­repay the hundreds of millions of dollars of indebtedness it accumulated during the course of” the ­alleged fraud, according to the lawsuit filed by the company’s creditors in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York.

“Aegean should not have been depending on the appointment of new directors in May 2018 to ­uncover [Melissanidis’] fraud. ­Defendants should have acted long before their appointment to monitor and control Aegean’s ­operations in a manner designed to prevent such misconduct.”

The complaint names one-time president Nikolas Tavlarios and former directors Peter Georgio­poulos, John Tavlarios and George Konomos as defendants. Melissanidis is not a defendant and has denied the allegations, first made by the company — now known as Minerva Bunkering — last ­autumn just before it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

Nikolas Tavlarios did not reply to a request for comment, and contact information for other defendants was not available.

The lawsuit alleges that Melissanidis’ temper and past legal troubles forced him out as Aegean’s chief executive and scuttled its first attempt at an initial public offering. He was still allegedly able to exercise control over the company as head of corporate development, from where he enriched himself and associates.

He allegedly used the UAE storage project to pay $126m to one of his companies, OilTank Engineering, during construction, as costs on the project ballooned from $105m to $172m by 2013.

Aegean also allegedly paid Grady Properties, controlled by Melissanidis’ son George, $6m in 2014.

Once the UAE facility was completed, Aegean was said to have paid four shell companies with supposed connections to Melissanidis associates to sell off-spec fuel to Aegean, which would blend it and then sell it back to the shell companies at a higher price.

According to the complaint, there was little documentation of these transactions between ­Aegean and Abdul Azim Trading, Miami Exports Group, Savina Mari­time and South Seas Maritime, and they may not have happened at all.

Those transactions totalled $2.07bn for more than 8m tonnes of fuel. They also allegedly put $200m on Aegean’s books as ­accounts receivable, including $30m to Grady Properties.

Melissanidis also allegedly used his influence to try to get Aegean to buy his HEC Europe in 2017, which would have given him a 33% stake in Aegean and prevented ­activist investors being able to appoint new directors after Georgio­poulos and John Tavlarios departed.

That merger was blocked by the courts, and eventually the investors took over the company, launching an investigation into the alleged fraud. In November 2018, the company declared bankruptcy. It emerged from Chapter 11 restructuring as Minerva Bunkering in April this year.

The creditors are led by trustee Peter Kravitz and represented by Reid Collins & Tsai.

As part of the bankruptcy settlement, the creditors will get all of the damages won in court. They are seeking damages for all losses.