Theresa May was last night urged to hand back almost £300,000 in Tory party donations received from a property tycoon who is profiting from an apartment block rife with prostitution in one of the wealthiest areas of London.
More than 100 prostitutes are reportedly working from the Chelsea Cloisters block which is owned by multi-millionaire Christopher Moran, 70, who has attended many events with members of the Royal Family and is worth more than £404 million.
The block of 670 apartments – where Mr Moran has an office – earns him millions of pounds in rent and service charges every year.
Undercover reporters from The Sunday Times were able to make 40 bookings with prostitutes using 23 apartments in the building – 15 of them in flats rented directly from Mr Moran’s company Realreed.
Multi-millionaire Christopher Moran, 70, is pictured alongside Prince Harry in Belfast in 2017
There is no suggestion that Mr Moran has any involvement with the prostitution. In a statement through his lawyers, he made it clear that his management took a ‘zero-tolerance’ approach to prostitution.
Men who have visited the building are said to have referred to it as having ‘ten floors of whores’ with others boasting on prostitution forums about the lewd acts they took part in whilst inside the cloisters.
One man said on a prostitute review website that he pushed a woman by the throat against a wall in a property before performing a sex act on her that left her ‘gagging’.
One escort agency, Diva Escorts, boasted that it had 100 women available at the premises on a single night. The women charge between £100 and £300.
A simple Google search for the agency shows just how widespread and blatant prostitution has become.
Another agency, called 24hr London Escort, gives its office address as Chelsea Cloisters. Its introduction to the building on the website makes for grim reading for Moran and his sons, Charles and Jamie, who manage the building.
‘For the punters that knows best, the Chelsea Cloisters in London SW3 has always been notorious place for accommodating sexy London escorts in London. And the tradition continues today,’ it reads.
Three women listed on the Divas website as being available in rooms at Chelsea Cloisters
Another agency, called Caprice also claims to be based in the building.
Describing how to find the building, the website says: ‘You can’t miss it. It’s the building teeming with escorts and rosy-cheeked men with empty wallets.’
And angry residents agree that you can’t miss it. One said she was embarrassed to call it her home while an elderly female resident who has lived in the building for ten years said ‘someone used to come and collect money once a week’ and that one woman banged on her door desperately seeking help because she was being threatened and another was being bullied by two men who she assumed were traffickers.
Another man posted a frustrated online post: ‘There are gangs of pimps laughing, joking threatening whilst their ‘property’ is inside being abused by wealthy men.
I’ve complained about this activity many times to local mps, mayor of London, police, newspapers, etc, and nothing is being done.’
The police did acknowledge to the Mail on Sunday that the building was ‘ a well-known cause of concern to us.’ They did so whilst declining to confirm claims of prostitution.
Chelsea Cloisters has been described as ‘hookers heaven’ and ’10 floors of whores’
While police won’t say whether their investigations in the building have concluded, there seems to be little doubt that prostitution takes place there.
Chelsea Cloisters features regularly on UK Punting, an online forum for men who use prostitutes. They repeatedly refer to the extensive availability of women in the building.
It has also been described as ‘hookers heaven’ and ’10 floors of whores’.
The adverts for girls available in South Kensington listed their breast size and hire prices
One resident said it was ‘obvious’ what was going on and had been warned about it by his landlord when he moved in
One user even allegedly speculated that it ‘probably has the highest population density of hookers per square mile in London’.
‘This past week alone, I have been to three different addresses in Chelsea Cloisters. Probably most of the flats in the past 10 years or so. In London terms, it’s akin to a battery farm,’ another man reportedly boasted.
Another resident said it was ‘obvious’ what was going on and had been warned about it by his landlord when he moved in.
‘You see lots of Eastern European girls walking around in dressing gowns and then loads of sleazy businessmen leaving their rooms at weird times of the day looking embarrassed. When you’re in the lift with them you can see them putting their wedding rings back on.’
Mr Moran, 316th in the Sunday Times Rich List, has previously donated £290,000 to the Tories on a personal and company basis.
According to the Mail on Sunday just over £140,000 came directly from his company which owns and rents out rooms in the block.
Up to 250 of the 670 apartments in the block can, it is claimed, be rented short-term, between a day and a year. This makes it an easy target for prostitution.
There is no suggestion that Mr Moran has any involvement with the alleged prostitution
The Chelsea Cloisters block (pictured) of 670 apartments – where Mr Moran has an office – earns him millions of pounds in rent and service charges every year.
Last night, leading anti-prostitution campaigner Julie Bindel said: ‘These are horrific revelations. Many, if not most, of the women being abused in prostitution in London will have been trafficked into the country and are working against their will.
This is a vast sum of dirty money that makes a mockery of Theresa May’s campaigning against sex slavery.
‘The Tory party should hand over the money immediately to be used to convict pimps and traffickers, to support trafficked women and to help them find a new life outside the horrors of the sex trade.’
The Prime Minister has pledged to eradicate human trafficking in the UK by 2030.
Labour MP Gavin Shuker, who chaired an all-party Parliamentary group which wrote a report on the sex trade last summer, said: ‘Theresa May must now give that money to charities that assist victims of human trafficking and use her powers to change the law and to tackle demand.’
His Rolls-Royce, with its personalised number plate, is often parked outside the front while he works alongside his two songs, Charles and Jamie, who manage the building. The management’s ground floor office is just yards from the reception where men file in each day with wallets full of cash for the women upstairs.
This woman, named Guadalupe, was listed as being available in the Chelsea Cloisters block
But Greg Hands, the Tory MP for Chelsea and Fulham, said a constituent had claimed to have alerted the building’s management about prostitution there – but that staff appeared not to have done anything.
Mr Hands then said to have reported the matter to the police.
Mr Moran, chairman of Co-operation Ireland, a charity that campaigns for peace, is a well-known Tory donor who masterminded the £30million sale of the party’s former Smith Square headquarters in 2007.
Last night, leading anti-prostitution campaigner Julie Bindel said the ‘revelations’ are ‘horrific’
He has held fundraisers for the party at his 15th Century 30- bedroom home Crosby Hall on the banks of the River Thames and hosted the Queen there two years ago at a private function.
Describing himself as ‘astronomically wealthy,’ Mr Moran made money on the insurance market Lloyd’s of London and on the stock market – adding to his fortune in property in recent years. He also owns the 40,000-acre Glenfiddich estate in the Scottish Highlands.
A property and finance tycoon, he had made his first million by the age of 21. But he has had a chequered career.
In 1982 he became the first person to be thrown out of Lloyd’s of London for ‘discreditable acts’ and was censured by the London Stock Exchange in 1986.
He also paid a £1.15million settlement after being accused of insider trading on the New York Stock Exchange in 1992, which he denied.
Mr Moran’s lawyers ‘categorically denied’ he had acquiesced with or tolerated any prostitution in Chelsea Cloisters and said he had not profited from its proceeds.
Lawyers for Christopher Moran also released the following statement:
‘Dr Christopher Moran strongly rejects the allegations concerning the Chelsea Cloisters complex.
‘Chelsea Cloisters constitutes a very small fraction of Dr Moran’s business interests and he has little or no involvement in its management.
‘Nevertheless, Dr Moran takes any allegations of this kind extremely seriously. As such he has investigated the position fully with the management of Chelsea Cloisters.
‘Chelsea Cloisters operates a zero tolerance policy towards prostitution on its premises. Neither Dr Moran nor the management of Chelsea Cloisters has in any way knowingly allowed or even tolerated the premises being used for prostitution, nor would ever do so.
‘On the very few occasions that incidents involving prostitution have come to their attention previously, the management always acts swiftly – but humanely – to bring such activities to an end, and will continue to do so, proactively involving and cooperating fully with the police and other authorities where necessary.’