Paul Hogan, an Australian actor known in the world as the Crocodile Dundee star has been accused of defrauding the tax office, by borrowing money from one of his offshore companies and then claiming a tax deduction of almost $1 million on the loan. The documents revealing this information have been kept in secret until this moment.
The documents concerning the loan scheme between Hogan and a company called GB Film Finance and registered in the British Virgin Islands detail for the first time some of the allegations made against Mr. Hogan by the Australian Crime Commission, taking him as part of Australia’s largest tax fraud inquiry, the $305 million tax haven probe, Operation Wickenby. The loan scheme of BVI company and Hogan is part of a “criminal investigation” according to an affidavit by crime commission investigator Ian Andrew.
GB Film Finance, registered in BVI, is owned 50/50 by Hogan and his fellow investor John Cornell. It is claimed that in July 2000 Hogan borrowed $4 mln from the film finance company, and created a fictitious dispute between his US lawyer and the company over early repayment of the loan. Hogan allegedly “settled” the loan in the same fictitious way, by repaying it with $600,000 interest through one of his offshore trusts, the Quatre Saison Trust, and claiming 910,884 Australian dollars as a tax deduction in his 2004 Australian income tax return.
The 68-year old Hogan is also accused of dodging tax in some periods when he was resident in neither Australia nor the US, and therefore not liable to pay tax in any of these countries. He himself denied that he committed any kind of crime, and said he has paid more taxes than it was needed.