Photo: Cadillac
Imagine you’re enjoying yourself at a five-star hotel for several weeks. But when you leave (without paying), you also leave your Cadillac Escalade ESV there... for fifteen years. This what Libyan soccer player Al-Saadi Gaddafi did. Now has to pay over $450,000 to get it back.
Al-Saadi Gaddafi is a retired professional soccer player, who also happens to be the son of the late Muammar Gaddafi, Libya's former supreme leader.
In 2007, the soccer player enjoyed a long stay at the five-star Hotel Excelsior in Rapallo, a town on the Italian Riviera coastline. Gaddafi was playing for the Italian team Sampdoria at the time and used to regularly throw lavish parties in his suites.
But one day, when Sampdoria dropped him, he left the hotel without paying a $450,000 bill and left his SUV, a Cadillac Escalade ESV 6.2, in the car park outside the hotel. He also ignored the letters that asked him to settle his bill.
Eventually, the hotel took Gaddafi to court, and he was ordered to pay his debt, as well as $4,330 in legal fees if he ever wants to see his car back. Since the car has been there for such a long time, hotel officials joke it became sort of a tourist attraction.
Excelsior director Aldo Werdin told The Daily Mail: “We have been waiting 15 years for Mr Gaddafi to settle his bill. Over the last few years we have tried many times to try and get this matter resolved but with no success. We even contacted the Libyan Embassy in Rome but they were unable to help.”
Mr. Werdin added: “He left the car at the front of the hotel and we don't even have the keys for it. It's actually become a bit of an attraction with people stopping to take a look at it.”
He added on the sightseeing spot that the parked Escalade ESV has become: “We have to give it a clean every now and then as having a dirty car outside the hotel wouldn't be very good for guests and it doesn't even have an Italian log book so we couldn't drive it here.”
In 2007, the soccer player enjoyed a long stay at the five-star Hotel Excelsior in Rapallo, a town on the Italian Riviera coastline. Gaddafi was playing for the Italian team Sampdoria at the time and used to regularly throw lavish parties in his suites.
But one day, when Sampdoria dropped him, he left the hotel without paying a $450,000 bill and left his SUV, a Cadillac Escalade ESV 6.2, in the car park outside the hotel. He also ignored the letters that asked him to settle his bill.
Eventually, the hotel took Gaddafi to court, and he was ordered to pay his debt, as well as $4,330 in legal fees if he ever wants to see his car back. Since the car has been there for such a long time, hotel officials joke it became sort of a tourist attraction.
Excelsior director Aldo Werdin told The Daily Mail: “We have been waiting 15 years for Mr Gaddafi to settle his bill. Over the last few years we have tried many times to try and get this matter resolved but with no success. We even contacted the Libyan Embassy in Rome but they were unable to help.”
Mr. Werdin added: “He left the car at the front of the hotel and we don't even have the keys for it. It's actually become a bit of an attraction with people stopping to take a look at it.”
He added on the sightseeing spot that the parked Escalade ESV has become: “We have to give it a clean every now and then as having a dirty car outside the hotel wouldn't be very good for guests and it doesn't even have an Italian log book so we couldn't drive it here.”
Gaddafi's son must pay £300k hotel bill to get car back https://t.co/KGRlim5kLp via @MailOnline
— nick pisa (@NickPisa) April 12, 2022
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