Sunday Times

Graham Ferguson Lacey drawn into Millwall redevelopment row

By Iain Dey

A MYSTERIOUS entrepreneur who has set himself at loggerheads with the board of Millwall football club, has links to the American property tycoon Stan Thomas, a Sunday Times investigation has revealed.
Graham Ferguson Lacey, an Isle of Man-based property developer and preacher with a chequered business history, will go head-to-head with the Millwall board at a shareholder meeting this week.
The resolutions that Lacey has proposed threaten to bankrupt Millwall if they are voted through, according to sources close to the club.
There has been a long-running row between Lacey and Millwall chairman John Berylson over plans to redevelop the 13-acre site the club occupies in southeast London, which could be worth as much as £130m based on recent property deals.
Berylson, whose family owns the Philadelphia Eagles American football team and formerly owned the Neiman Marcus department-store chain, is working on a long-term redevelopment plan for the club site with Lewisham council.
He has pumped £8m into the club to keep it afloat and said he wanted to get the League One team back on track before worrying about redevelopment.
Lacey is said to favour a more radical overhaul of the site, similar to plans put forward by previous club chairman Peter de Savary, a long-term associate of Lacey's. He has labelled Berylson's plans "disturbing".
Although Lacey has kept quiet about the exact nature of his proposals, a paper trail at Companies House suggests that Lacey's move may be supported by Thomas, who is planning to develop the former Port of London building in London's Trinity Square into a luxury hotel.
Sports Regeneration Ltd, the vehicle through which Lacey holds his Millwall stake, is registered to the same address as Leisure Lifestyle Ventures, a company of which Thomas is the sole director. The two companies were registered within weeks of one another through the law firm Denton Wilde Sapte, and initially had similar names.
Lacey is also a director of two Isle of Man companies owned by one of Thomas's subsidiaries, and is reported to be a partner in a $2.5 billion (£1.2 billion) redevelopment plan in Orlando, Florida, led by Thomas.
Thomas is also thought to have acquired a Tyrannosaurus Rex dinosaur fossil from Lacey.
The resolutions Lacey has put forward for Wednesday's meeting at The Den, Millwall's stadium, would force the club to put any decisions on the club's property to a shareholder vote.
This week's meeting alone has already cost the heavily loss-making club more than £100,000. Legal advice received by the club has suggested that it would have to call a vote just to buy a new drinks machine for the training ground, thanks to the wording of Lacey's resolutions.
Lacey has claimed that the resolutions should have "no effect" on the day-to-day running of the club.