NCA seizes Alwoodley home after court ruling against former Leeds Lord Mayor Abigail Marshall Katung

The house on Sandmoor Drive, in the Alwoodley area of the city, was seized by the NCA after the High Court ruled that Mrs Marshall Katung had no legitimate legal interest in it.

Marshall Katung, who represents the Little London & Woodhouse, previously paid around £400,000 towards the purchase of the property.

Marshall Katung was elected as a councillor in 2019, originally as a member of the Labour Party, and served as Lord Mayor from 2024 to 2025. She currently sits as an independent.

A Leeds City Council spokesperson said: “At the time this story first emerged we were unaware of the personal civil court case between the former Lord Mayor of Leeds, Abigail Marshall Katung and the National Crime Agency (NCA) until publication of the High Court judgement.

"In the light of this we conducted thorough investigations and found no connection to the council in this case."

The NCA originally obtained legal title to the house in October 2020 as part of a £10 million civil recovery settlement with a businessman suspected of money laundering offences.

Mrs Marshall Katung was not party to the earlier proceedings, the agency said, but had entered into an agreement with the previous owner to buy the property in 2015.

The court heard that she had entered into an agreement in 2015 to buy the luxury home for £1 million and had paid a deposit of around £400,000. The remaining balance was never paid and the purchase was never completed.

There is no suggestion that Mrs Marshall Katung was aware of the former owner’s alleged criminal activity.

During proceedings, it was revealed that the “vast majority” of funds used for Mrs Marshall Katung’s deposit were routed from Nigeria to the UK, using an informal value transfer system described in court as “parallel” or “black market”.

The judge said Mrs Marshall Katung had disclosed “very little” documentation concerning the transfer of the funds into her company’s UK bank account and that her husband, Nigerian state senator Sunday Marshall Katung, who was alleged to be the source of the funds, did not submit a witness statement.

In his ruling, the judge described these facts as “telling omissions” from her evidence and concluded he was not satisfied that Mrs Marshall Katung was “a particularly reliable witness”.

In June 2025, the High Court found that Mrs Marshall Katung had no legitimate interest or right to the property. Her subsequent attempt to appeal the judgment was refused, with a judge stating she would have “no real prospect of success”.

The NCA obtained a writ of possession in February this year, which was enforced on Thursday, March 5.

Rob Burgess, Head of Asset Denial at the NCA, said: "The NCA uses both civil and criminal powers to investigate the provenance of assets in the UK believed to have been acquired using the proceeds of crime.

"This matter has taken a considerable amount of time to litigate - at the taxpayer's expense. Now that the NCA has gained possession of the property, it will be sold, with the proceeds being returned to the public purse."