The owners of U.P.’s Cineplex and Bobby’s Marketplace likely will have to pay more than $10 million to settle a past due obligation to a bank, according to a recent court ruling.
Elton Leonard, who is listed in court records as the businesses’ director, and his father Noel “Bobby” Leonard were named as defendants in a March 13 lawsuit filed by the firm Harneys on behalf of FirstCaribbean International Bank Limited, which lent the businesses $9.5 million on Sept. 29, 2008, according to documents on file at the High Court Registry.
With legal and court fees, the bank claimed $10,005,937.19 “in respect of the balance outstanding on loan facilities,” records show.
After the Leonards failed to file a defence in the case, officials at the High Court Registry recorded a default judgment for the bank, according to the records.
A 2008 agreement on file at the registry shows that the Leonards’ loan is secured with the businesses’ land, building and other assets. But the judgment’s impact on the supermarket chain and the territory’s only theatre isn’t yet clear.
Contacted May 28, Elton Leonard declined to comment for this story, as did Peter Edmunds, FirstCaribbean’s Virgin Islands country manager.
Other suits
Court records indicate that the bank lawsuit is only the latest in a string of recent legal actions facing the Leonards’ businesses. In the past three years, six other suppliers and vendors have sued Bobby’s seeking payment for goods and services provided. These suits made claims for more than $600,000, according to court records. Some of those claims have resulted in default judgments.
The business owners also have faced other challenges in recent years.
After previously operating a smaller theater, Elton Leonard received initial permission in 2004 from the Town and Country Planning Department to build U.P.’s. But the process to build the six-screen theatre was rocky, resulting in TCPD officials issuing at least one stop-work order and multiple compliance notices for the structure, which also features an extensive food court and a 12-lane bowling alley in its basement.
Officials were primarily concerned about a lack of sufficient fire and disaster control systems, adequate railings, traffic planning and pedestrian space that may have posed a threat to the public, Rosalie Adams, permanent secretary in the Premier’s Office, said in a June 2010 interview.
In May of that year, six months after the building’s opening, an interagency team including officials from the Labour Department, TCPD, the Building Authority, and Fire and Rescue Services toured the structure, making a series of recommendations for improvements.
Additionally, the Environmental Health Division sued Elton Leonard in 2011, alleging that a longstanding practice at both the cinema and the Road Town supermarket of discharging grease and muck from the businesses into nearby ghuts was a health nuisance.
Mr. Leonard, who denied that the businesses were the source of noxious odours, was eventually ordered by a magistrate to install grease traps at the businesses, have workers clear out the ghuts, and pay a $1,158 fine.
Positive reaction
Despite such concerns, U.P.’s Cineplex has been welcomed by many residents and political leaders who have long expressed concerns that the VI doesn’t have enough entertainment facilities, especially for youth.
“It’s lovely: fabulous, with a capital F,” Cassandra Percival said of the cineplex on its Dec. 3, 2010 opening night.
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