A British TV art expert who sold works to a suspected Hezbollah financier is sentenced to prison

LONDON (AP) — An art expert who appeared on the BBC’s Bargain Hunt show was sentenced Friday to two and a half years in prison for failing to report his sale of pricey works to a suspected financier of Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group.

Oghenochuko Ojiri, 53, pleaded guilty to eight offenses under the Terrorism Act 2000. The art sales took place between October 2020 and December 2021.

Ojiri, who also appeared on the BBC’s Antiques Road Trip, faced a possible sentence of five years in prison in the hearing at London’s Central Criminal Court, which is better known as the Old Bailey.

In addition to the prison term, Justice Bobbie Cheema-Grubb said Ojiri faces an additional year on license.

Ojiri sold about 140,000 pounds ($185,000) worth of artworks to Nazem Ahmad, a diamond and art dealer sanctioned by the U.K. and U.S. as a Hezbollah financier. The sanctions were designed to prevent anyone in the U.K. or U.S. from trading with Ahmad or his businesses.

“This prosecution, using specific Terrorism Act legislation, is the first of its kind and should act as a warning to all art dealers that we can, and will, pursue those who knowingly do business with people identified as funders of terrorist groups,” said Commander Dominic Murphy, head of the Metropolitan Police’s Counter Terrorism Command.

The Met’s investigation into Ojiri was carried out alongside Homeland Security in the U.S., which is conducting a wider investigation into alleged money laundering by Ahmad using shell companies.

Ahmad was sanctioned in 2019 by the U.S. Treasury, which said he was a prominent Lebanon-based money launderer involved in smuggling blood diamonds, which are mined in conflict zones and sold to finance violence.

Two years ago, the U.K. Treasury froze Ahmad’s assets because he financed Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Shiite militant organization that has been designated an international terrorist group.

Following Ojiri’s arrest in April 2023, the Met obtained a warrant to seize a number of artworks, including a Picasso and Andy Warhol paintings, belonging to Ahmad and held in two warehouses in the U.K. The collection, valued at almost 1 million pounds, is due to be sold with the funds to be reinvested back into the police, the Crown Prosecution Service and the Home Office.